Could I draw my subjects freehand? Yes. Do I want to spend three weeks (never said I could do it quickly 😄!) preparing a drawing as a base for a painting when I could 'cheat' and do it in ten minutes? No. If my end result was a drawing, then I would want to do it freehand but when I am champing at the bit to add glorious colour onto paper, nothing is going to slow this racehorse down.
Of course, tracing isn't really cheating unless you are entering some kind of a drawing competition. Even the famous modern-day artist, David Hockney, has confessed to the sin and, surprisingly maybe, famous artists of yesteryear have done the same. I'll add a link to a Guardian article about it on my External Links page.
First, I find the subject I want to paint and take a photograph, or find a 'free from copyright' image I wish to use. Usually my paintings are from my own photos. I upload the image to my computer and bring it up on the monitor after 'flipping' (reversing) the image in Microsoft 'Photos' so that the left becomes right. Then I disable the touchscreen facility (you may or may not have a touchscreen) via computer Device Manager (it's listed in Microsoft's Control Panel), then I click Human Interface Devices and right-click on HID Compliant Touchscreen, thus enabling me to temporarily disable the touchscreen device.
I tape the tracing paper (I use A3 63gsm) to the monitor and trace my subject using a 'B' not hard, pencil. When that is done, I enable touchscreen, flip the image back to how it was, and transfer the image to my paper by putting the traced image pencil side down and retracing the lines on the reverse side. I think most people know how to trace.
And that is it.
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