Best Digital Art Hacks for Today’s Trends

Digital art is constantly in flux, with inspired creators making a splash across the industry every day. Custom brushes, base meshes, and pre-made assets allow digital artists to stretch their imaginations faster than ever before—and it can be hard to keep pace with the latest trends!

There’s always more to learn, and staying on top of the new means rapidly familiarizing yourself with new techniques and styles. But who’s got time to learn everything from scratch? How can you embrace digital trends without being crushed by steep learning curves?

Don’t worry! We’ve put together some of the best digital art hacks for updating your work without downshifting your output. 

1. Neon Madness 

Whether it’s a dusky cyberpunk dystopia or an irresistibly illuminated advertisement, neon nostalgia is taking over today’s cityscapes. Neon signs were all the rage in the 1980s, but recreating the brilliant glow without gas and electricity can be a serious challenge for digital artists. 

Get it right, and neon can set your artwork on fire. Get it wrong? Just burn it…

Fortunately, custom brush packs can give you convincing neon highlights without creating those ethereal glows from scratch. This cyberpunk neon brush pack for Procreate lets you sketch out glitter, fog, brushwork, textures, and calligraphy with the swipe of a stylus. Whether you’re igniting a smoky background or highlighting a lowlife in an alley, this pack will put the finishing touches on your futuristic urban artwork.  

2. Capturing Fluidity

Classic geometry is timeless for a reason, but today’s trends are all about capturing fluid shapes and forms. However, improvising the fascinating whimsy and appeal of freeform design can be one of the most difficult challenges for artists to master—especially when you don’t have direct physical contact with your canvas. 

The 87 abstract brushes in this bundle give you an instant art hack for abstract forms like swirls, shapes, and smoke trails. Each one produces unique feathered edges and is variable in shape, giving you a high degree of digital control over techniques that traditionally require physical paint and tools.

3. Sketchbook Aesthetic

With increasing trends around old-school arts like leather bookbinding and DIY decoration, personalization and hand-crafted aesthetics are beginning to dominate. Many digital creators are embracing the freeform creativity and rough aesthetic of their sketchbooks—but you’ll need more than a pencil and paper to capture the look on your screen. 

That’s where a great set of sketch brushes can save you hours of frustration. The 68 retro pencils in this pack for Procreate capture the essence of classic drawing with an effortless authenticity.

And if you’re all-in on charcoal and love Procreate, there’s no substitute for the 43 smudgeable brushes in this set. They’ll give you the look and feel of traditional charcoal without micromanaging every stroke.

4. Taming Textures

Sci-fi and fantasy are as popular as ever, but nailing texture is essential for drawing your audience into your world and separating your work from the pack. Textures like skin, wood grain, rusted metal, scales, and feathers can all consume hours of your time, and aesthetic expectations are rising fast. 

Fortunately, there are dozens of custom brushes that let you rapidly create some of the most challenging and time-consuming textures. Sketching a fire drake like Smaug? This incredible dragon scale pack gives you 120 options for customizing every inch of his impenetrable armor. You’ll be able to focus your energy on the artistic details that really matter—like setting Lake-town ablaze!

5. Optimizing Workflows

Saving time is a trend that will never go out of style, and digital artists are notorious for pouring hours into elements that might take traditional artists only a few brushstrokes to perfect. Optimizing your workflow is essential for improving your output and meeting those ever-tightening deadlines. 

So where can you save time without sacrificing originality and quality? 

Base meshes are a great way to get a jumpstart on your creations by avoiding mistakes in proportion and rigging that can plague your workflow downstream. Even a simple set like the 30 medieval axes in this set gives you a solid foundation for focusing on the elements that matter, like customization and rendering. 

Premade backgrounds, like the options in this 2D fantasy bundle, can also give your characters a quick setting without pulling time away from refining critical details. 

And if you’re working in architecture or design, having a tasteful assortment of premade plants like the ones in this bundle gives you time-saving art hacks that won’t make your work look hacky. 

Hack It Until You Crack It With Cubebrush

Mastering new art trends from scratch can easily take over your life, and once you get one right, you’ll have three new ones to tackle. But with these digital art hacks, you’ll be able to get great results quickly and buy yourself time to take a deep dive into the techniques that resonate with your aesthetic and style. 

If you’re dreaming of brilliant neons or scruffy sketches on your digital canvas, the Cubebrush Marketplace has the resources, brushes, and tutorials to bring your vision to life. Start exploring today to get a jump on tomorrow’s hottest art trends.