I made a little discovery of an alternate paper for Copics than the Neenah and marker papers that I’ve used for decades….and it’s a paper that really shouldn’t, by all rights, be for alcohol markers! It’s my favorite pencil drawing paper, and I was surprised that my little idea worked!
I’ve wanted to use pencils on top of alcohol marker, but hadn’t done so in ages because, well, marker papers and neenah don’t ‘feel’ as nice as Stonehenge drawing paper. So I had the idea to see if I could bring the markers to the pencil paper rather than the pencils to the marker paper.
Caveat:
I do realise that some artists won’t like the more pencil-ly look; totally fine! I’ve always resisted the tendency toward an almost digitally-perfect blend. I love to see the hand of the artist shown in their work. With the advent of that “perfection” in AI, I relish it all the more.
Tutorial: Alternate paper for Copics? Bear cub drawing
This won’t be a solution for everything, by any means; and switching to this paper for ALL your alcohol marker work might get cost prohibitive. But for fur? For fur it’s pretty amazing!
Watch the video below and scroll to the end to leave comments or questions — or click HERE to watch it on YouTube and leave comments over there. I read both dutifully!
A few more tips
A few things I learned along the way:
- if your markers are dry, they’ll feel a little dryer on this paper. The soft surface has a little drag naturally, and a dry marker responds. But it’s nothing that more layers can’t fix.
- Colors are not as cartoony-bright as on some other papers like marker paper or Neenah. But since I love making things look realistic, the slight dulling down is perfect for me. IF you like brighter, just step up the saturation in your color choices.
- Alcohol can serve as a light blending solution – so how about a Copic? BINGO. You do have to clean off marker nibs on scratch paper, and it can stain them but it won’t have a permanent effect other than nib discoloring.
- The technique I use with a lot of textures is washing over the area with a glaze of color to soften it and pull it together–and it works even BETTER on Stonehenge than Neenah!
Perfect for fur
I enjoyed a couple drawings SO much so that I started immediately prepping a class series that a lot of students have asked me for, because this paper, marker, and pencil combo are perrrrrfect for it: ANIMALS! This lil bear will be a lesson in the “big” class (read on.)
Drawing on Nature
I’m calling it the “Drawing on Nature” series of classes; don’t worry, I’m not headed exclusively in this direction, but I’ve been needing to find a way to create more advanced courses without pricing myself compeltely out of the market! I’m so used to making 5-10 lessons out of a topic that I couldn’t figure out what to do when each lesson triples in length from what I normally do!
So instead, classes will be for invididual drawings, not a huge set. Choose your adventure!
I’m hoping to have everything ready in maybe a week or so – join the art-classes email list if you haven’t already, I’ll be shouting from the rooftops as soon as it’s all ready to roll!
There will be discounts if you sign up for a few of the single classes at a time, so be sure to read to get the coupon code you’ll need; I can’t figure out how to automate it, since the plugin I bought for bulk purchase discounts won’t work on classes, so coupon code it is.
There’ll also be a get-em-all class with each of the 10 drawings in it PLUS the narrated bear drawing. The bear’s the only one with much of a scene – that log was way too much fun to play with! And he won’t be a separate class, he’ll be in the big class only.
On jury duty
I’m starting jury duty today – and I’m one of those weirdos who relishes the chance to perform civic duty! I’d be altogether too happy to serve my community if they choose me. I was on a case a few decades ago and it was a fascinating process – and gave me so much confidence in our judicial system. Crossing my fingers I get selected. 🙂
I may or may not have some creativity for you the rest of the week depending on that – but as Arnold says…. I’ll be back!
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This is amazing!
Good luck with jury duty. I’m one of those people who would love to be called up. I’d love to learn more about the system too.
Hi Sandy, I am long time follower of your blog, I just don’t comment all that often. Your past several posts with all of the animals are simply amazing. They are gorgeous. I love bears (my high school mascot was the grizzly bear). I love to see all of your creations and I love that you take the time to share everything with us. Thank you.