You don't need to be an expert in graphic design, debugging, or Django logging to understand the profit potential in digital art. What was once a strange, little-known corner of the commercial art market has gone mainstream. Take a stroll down any big-city's art walk on a cool Friday night and you'll see all sorts of interesting new items that portent huge changes in what people buy to decorate their homes.

Only a decade ago, digital art purveyors were almost unheard of in galleries, on art walks and in places where local craft people display their wares. Now, it's sometimes hard to spot the digital creators from the old-fashioned oil painters and sculptors. Here are some of the biggest areas where digital art has made inroads into the for-profit art market:

Prints 

No other area of modern commercial art has been so affected by digital design as prints. Perhaps it's just common sense. Prints have been machine-pressed for decades and always involved more technology than other fields of art. When digital printing became commercially viable for large, high-quality works of art about a decade ago, there was no looking back. Even after an original print of, say, a painting is made, artist can use various digital techniques to add or subtract to what's already on the paper.

Abstract Portraits 

Portraiture is one area where digital and traditional art has combined in a wonderful, mind-expanding way. Many artists begin with a digital print, blow it up to a huge size and work with it from there, adding paint or other mediums to it to create unique pieces. This trend has been most successful in portraits, works that include the human face as the focal point. Galleries have opened up to the trend as well, often combining traditional portrait showings with pure digital shows and hybrid works. For digital artists, the human face has a special sort of intrigue.

Sculpture 

With the advent of digital 3D printing, many people thought the sculpture market would dry up, but it's done exactly the opposite. Now there are just more options for the art buyer. The digital art craze within the field of sculpture has taken off in Asia more than anywhere else. Designers are awash in commissions to come up with busts, abstract pieces and historical works for public and private spaces.

Home Decor 

Ask any interior decorator and you'll learn about the commercial power of digital art. Many upscale homes now opt for digital artworks for large walls and living areas. A current sub-trend is altered photographs, both original and public domain works. This type of digital creativity has been around the office scene for a number of years but is now trickling down into the real estate market. Walls that once held abstract acrylic landscapes and portraits now feature wild scenes that test the vision and challenge the mind. Think of Escher, Dali and Einstein collaborating on a gigantic altered photo and you have a rough idea of the kind of digital works that decorators pine for.