CopicArt – Illustrating with Markers

Archive for the ‘Beginners’ Category

   I know it is the end of the month, so nothing better than to post this before March. Well after a long time, the re-make of my Copic girl drawing is done. Here are the steps I followed to finally finish the image.

   My first issue was to decide the type of background I wanted to use. So, using an extra copy of the image, I drew a the outlines of a brick wall.

Oh, no! I ruined my image!! Not quite. Since I wanted to use my ABS to color the BG, I masked my image with a frisket, and then colored the background.

 Here is the image without the protective film. Looks like my work was safe after all.

Using the outlined image of the wall, and a light box; I added the basic shapes of my bricks.

Last step was to shade the bricks and add highlights. The result, a much better picture than my original, I hope you like it.

  I didn’t disappear again. Work projects for Valentine’s Day kept me away from my home computer.  Last year I did my first posts on CopicArt.com, featuring some drawings made by myself of Anime girls with huge Copics on each hand.

  At the time they looked OK to me, as I didn’t had much practice with my Copics, my color selection was quite limited, and I didn’t used other media to combine effects. Last Sunday I decided to re-do all of my original drawings, using different colors and techniques, and if possible, implement an idea for Backgrounds that I saw in a Book.

Here are some pictures of the original image and the coloring so far.

   Well if you tough I disappeared again, well not this time. Well, thankfully I was able to finally find a dealer that sells regular Memento ink pads at the CHA super show. The pad that I had before was the tear drop kind, and it made stamping large images a real pain (Unless there is a magic trick about those kind of pads that I’m not aware of).

So, for the last few days I have been stamping images like crazy, and gathering material for new Blog posting. And what is so special about the Memento Ink Pad, well the ink pads that I used in the past weren’t compatible with the alcohol ink of my Copics, meaning, to actually be able to color any of my rubber stamps I have to go thru the lengthy process of Stamping, scanning, re-touching, and printing the resulted image. And that is the reason why I was a heavy advocate of Digital Stamps.

I still like using Digital stamps, but for now, it is time to use my Rubber. For today’s project I stamped an INKADINKADO stamp, with my Memento Ink Pad, on Georgia Pacific card stock.

First I colored the skin. My base color is E000, then added E00 as soft shadows, E11 and E51 were used for hard shadows. Note that I used the same kind of coloring as described on my previous Blog entry.

for the hair I used the same color combination of that entry as well: YR21 for base color, YR23 for mid tones, and YR24 for dark tones, then I went all over the hair again with the YR21. For the Bear I used the YR23, and YR24 colors.

Next it was time for the Clouds, and the boy’s clothing to be colored. So for the clouds I used B0000 as base, and B01 for shadows. For the boy’s shirt, B00 as base, and B01 for shadows. And finally, the overall, and sail of the boat: B32 as base, B34 for shadows.

Looks nice so far. For the sand I used YR21 as base, and YR23 for shadows. Yes, many of the colors are repeated.

And finally, for the sea I used the following colors: G00 as base, and G02 for shadows. Indeed, I did a green sea, why? Too much blue on the image already.

I didn’t use any fancy technique, or coloring.Junst something that works, and looks good, I hope you like it.

The reason why I was working only with digital stamps and my own drawings was because I just couldn’t stamp really well (or so I thought). One of my problems was that no matter how I placed my stamp, I just couldn’t get a good impression, and when I was able to get a good image, my ink would smear. No hope for me and stamping.

            This past weekend I went to an outdoor marketplace, and found out a booth with a nice lady who was selling stamps, and inkpads. I was expecting her to just ignore me (the ugly guy), and focus on her female customers. But instead, she was really nice and we spoke about my Copic addiction and of course my problem with stamping. She gave me a few pointers on how to stamp correctly, and in her booth I was finally able to find a Memento Tuxedo Black ink pad. So basically I solved my two main problems in just one day, Thank You So much Lady (sorry but her name is hard to spell).

            Today’s project is one of the stamps that I bought on Sunday, stamped in Georgia Pacific cardstock, with Memento Tuxedo Black ink. This is the second time I have used my original stamped image directly, and I think I love it. The name of the stamp is: Proud Mother Rabbit, by Stamps Happen.

            These are the Copic colors used: B00, E31, BG93, BG94, G17, RV29, RV42, and R20. To compliment the image I only used two PrismaColor pencils: Dark Green, and Violet Blue. I hope you like it.

Final Image:

First order of business here, I just added a permanent link to Dustin Pike’s blog. Dustin has some beautiful Digital stamps for sale, and every Wednesday he’s so generous as to give away one digital stamp for free. His work is very clean and professional, I would advise you to visit him o regular basis.

Dustin Pike’s site http://dustinpike.blogspot.com/

            Today’s project is indeed one of those free stamps. For this truck I used the following Copic Markers: E35, E33, T7, T9, R24, R29, BV23, BV25, Y17, and B000. For shades I used this PrismaColor pencils: Sky Blue, Light Cerulean Blue, Pink Umber, Tuscan Red, and Burnt Ochre.

            I don’t know, but now that I think about, I’m pretty close to make a card with one of these stamps.

Well, this time I don’t quite have any in between image for this project. Why? Because when I was taking the progress images my regular Olympus was without charge (The missing charger issue), so I used my Kodak instead, and to my dismay I found out that it wasn’t designed for close range pictures, and they all came blurry.

So here is the scanned image of a digital Stamp that I got from one of Joni’s posts.

Finally the final steps for the Girl & Boy Digital Stamp project. I was able to squeeze the last bit of charge of my Digital Camera to get the last steps of this image, and for the finished image I scanned the drawing. This morning I went hunting for a new Camera, but the one I liked was out of stock, so I came back home decided to use my old Kodak for the time being. Well, I remembered that this camera came with a small tripod, so I searched for it, and what was my surprise to find the charger I was looking for sitting next to the tripod. So that means no new digital camera will be needed.

            The final element to color was the heart. My base colors were RV21-R24 Copic, and for the shades I selected the following PrismaColor pencils: Pink, Poppy Red, and Tuscan Red.

            And here is the scanned image of the project, I hope you like it.

So here is another step of the coloring of that cute digital stamp of two kids holding a heart. But first an occurrence today while taking pictures of the progress so far, my camera’s battery got extremely low, and no matter how much I searched, I just can’t find the charger. Good thing I have old Kodak sitting around (uses AA batteries), so until I decide to either get a new charger or get a new camera, the image resolution for the projects will decrease. On a better note, this is the fourth post of the month, which means I already surpassed last month’s post count, and that we are in good pace as far as updates.

            So the next element to color was the girl, so I started with her dress. For the dress I wanted a softer tone, so the main colors were BV000, and B000, the shadows were drawn with the following PrismaColor pencils, Lilac, and Light Cerulean Blue.

            For the hair and skin I used the same colors as the Boy, E00-E01 for the skin, and YR31- Golden Rod PrismaColor for the hair.

            I will save the heart part for tomorrow’s update, and the final image (scanned, because of the camera issue).

Today I got some free time and decided to color this cute Digital Stamp that I bought some months ago at Squigglefly (http://www.squigglefly.com/). They have some nice images and good prices too.

            At this moment I haven’t finished coloring the image, but wanted to show the progress so far. First element to be colored was the boy’s overalls, for that I used my B24 as base color, and then added shadows with the Indigo Blue PrismaColor. Later used my V09 to color the patch on his overalls, and used the same Indigo Blue for the shadows.

            The next element was his shirt, and for that I used the BG93 as base color, and the Olive Green PrismaColor for the shadows. For the shoes I used E33, and E57 as base colors, then the Dark Umber, and Burnt Ochre PrismaColor for shadows.

            For the hair I used the YR31 Copic, and Golden Rod PrismaColor. The skin was colored first with my E00 as base, and then my E01 for the shadows.

            And this is where I am right now, with the first element of my digital stamp finished. Next I’m planning on coloring the little girl and then the heart.

On my last post I showed you the final test image for this project, without any of the in-between images that I always take. As previously mentioned, I’m starting to use more media elements on my images, like PrismaColor pencils, Spica pens, Opaque White, and now Sharpie Metallic pens. It is quite interesting to see the difference that it makes the use of those other elements in comparison with my previous renders.

            If you remember the way I used to do denim (http://copicart.com/?p=361) looked OK, but there is a noticeable difference by using PrismaColor pencils to draw the shades over a basic Copic layer. On my next post I will go on more detail how to do this kind of denim with pencils, so for now just compare the result with the images on the link I posted and tell me if it’s better or not.

            So I started my coloring with the shorts, why? Because they are the darkest part of my image, and for me it is better to start with the darkest element. My reason for doing it this way is simple, if by mistake I color outside the denim area (into the legs or shirt), it is easier to fix that area when its white than when it has the skin colors applied. On the other hand, most likely no one will notice if I make the mistake of going over the dark element of my drawing (Denim) with my skin tone.

            As you can see I colored the belt as well with a light brown Copic, then added shadows and details with pencils. Pencils are not a medium that I have used regularly in the past, so there are many things I don’t know about. For example, I couldn’t apply my white color in places where I made the shadows with pencils, the white was either too dim, or it didn’t colored at all. For that matter I bought a couple Sharpie metallic pens.

            The next step was to color her shirt with almost the same process, this time I did use an extra Copic for the shades, and then used my pink PrismaColor to add textures. See how the belt looks nice with those metallic dots.

            The final step was to color the head and her upper body. The hair was colored with two Copic Colors (Base and shadows), then I used two color pencils to add some contrast and texture to the hair, the skin was colored with Copics only.

Here is the final image, I hope you like it.