After the reaction to the last video I posted, I hope you’re ready for some new art with the Staedtler Pigment Pens! The video announces the winner of the giveaway…but I wanted to also talk about papers for these pens.

And yes, I did hurt my hand! Walking the pups gets dangerous when the sidewalk jumps up to grab my shoe. My right hand took the brunt, but I saved you from having to look at a wound; when I see any wounded fingers, hands, or limbs on YouTube or any social media, I can’t click away fast enough!

This first drawing was done on Yupo for NAMTA, it’s a synthetic (think plastic) paper. It does some of what you might think would happen on plastic. While those who love watercoloring on yupo seem to be fine with it, I’ve never discovered that love; I like it for pen and ink, and for alcohol inks …but not with water.

That means the pigment brush pens can’t be used easily with water; and with limited success with the blending liquid. Things just stay sticky. However for some subjects this paper can be lovely. This parrot, who I’ve named Alex, looks great from a distance, but it does show that you don’t get much real blending done. Nothing soft edged.

Tutorial: Papers for water based markers | Drawing a pelican in 6 steps

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!

Six steps to drawing a brown pelican

I know, I know, it’s a silly thing to make it seem this easy, but hey – go download the photo and give it a try! You can even trace the outlines if you need to, then take it step by step.

Facial skin/eye ring

Which term is more correct? I need my own personal ornithologist to explain all this stuff to me.

Head feathers

A group of very soft feathers contrasts nicely with the hard details elsewhere. Pet a pelican here, for sure. If he lets you.

Contour feathers

All the outside feathers we see are for decoration/mating as well as to make flights smoother.

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Fine art sale donations

I’m also giving a 10% donation from every fine art purchase from now til the end of July! Please help me clear the shop and raise money to do good for kids. They need to know how valuable art is and to get the support at this age that will set them up for a lifetime of creating.

Both birdos in this post are for sale over in my shop – go check them out as well as everything else that’s available! Tap on any photo or button below to shop.

Notes from an art journey? Wuzzat? Well, it’s different for every person. It’ll be dependent on your goals….is your art just for you and your mental or spiritual health? Recovering from an illness in your body and needing something to get you moving? Relaxing after a long day at work? Trying to make a living?

An art journey is the path an artist takes as they learn and grow and develop. It may or may not result in finding your “style” or inventing something so new and great that you make a million bucks with no effort. It may or may not get you to the place you’d like to be with your art – because it’s a journey. It’s got a progression to it, and as far as I know, we never fully arrive. Because the goal posts are always moving further forward.

In the video I’ll talk a little about my own journey. It’s been rocky of late, not because I’m not learning and growing my skills, but because being an artist in a rough economy is difficult. People are not opening pockets for anything beyond necessities until we get a sense of where prices are headed. I totally get that! But it still makes my artist life a challenge, just not one that’ll defeat me. 🙂

In today’s project I’ll show you some of the steps in creating an urban sketch – well maybe more than a sketch, but it still has that vibe! Pen and ink first, using Staedtler’s pigment pens to draw with, then the pigment brush markers.

Note, I’m not paid for this post or any other. Staedtler IS offering up a prize for one of YOU though, and they’ll share my work, that’s all I get out of this. Except for the fun of making the art!

Tutorial: Art Journey Notes | Urban Sketch with Staedtler pigment pens 

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!

An inspiring “ad” video

I wish more ads were inspiring like this! Watch below — or click HERE to watch it on YouTube and leave comments over there for Staedtler.

These pigment markers

I’ve created a number of projects with them, and they’re fun! They dry permanently so you can color over them once dry without making mud. But if you want the colors to blend, the blending liquid reactivates it! 

These pens make strong, vibrant art, or also can create some fine washy appearances too, depending on how much marker you apply, when you do so, and how much water you use. Pretty cool to get so much out of one product. 

Greens with browns

In my previous video, I talked about adding some browns to alcohol marker or watercolor – the same applies to any medium because it’s all color theory! Once you start to get a handle on what color can adjust another color, it becomes easy to make a drawing with colors that don’t exist on their own.

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The architectural elements

Creating shadows is what really makes buildings sing – which means you want to do your sketching when the sun is not directly overhead. Shadows are far more interesting when at an angle to your subject! Don’t forget to make plants in the shade a little duller and bluer than those in the sunshine.

Shadows on roads can REALLY make a drawing come alive! Adding the plants on the bottom right as well as a second unseen pole…..those made me so happy!

Interested in one of these sketches?

Maybe you know someone in St Augustine who needs this drawing. Or an LA resident who loves the location of the piece I drew at NAMTA! Tap on either pic to shop for it in the store.

I’m back with another watercolor pen project! Most pens can create this way, but not all will do it in the same way….some brands are more pigmented or less, etc. But more than that, these Staedtler piment brush pens have some properties that can make layering especially easy, because this brand dries permanent. So it won’t pull up and rewet layers underneath and create messes. 

At NAMTA in Seattle this past weekend, I was demonstrating with these pens, and wanted to show you just one of the projects there. (If I met you, leave a comment and say hey!)

Tutorial: Create EASY sea creatures in markers

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!

Sea creatures: Jellyfish and Seahorse

The easier of the two, in my mind, is the jelly fish:

1. Create the bell of the jellyfish with an arc at the bottom – paint it with water, drop in color by touching a marker to the water.
2. Make long irregular squiggly tentacles that vary in thickness, and apply color.
3. Make more. Note that criscrossing them will make them bleed, so dry it once you’re out of space.
4. Layer over a few more – keeping them coming from the center of the bell.
5. Draw in some stringy style tentacles.

A little more difficult is the seahorse:

1. Create an S curve in clean water, thick in the center and pointed at the outside points. Drop in color.
2. Paint a triangle that thins out at the point for a nose, add color.
3. Join the two with water.
4. Create the tail with a spiral to it.
5. Dry, and layer over more color/texture/segments as desired.
6. Add bubbles by painting drops and touching color to them.

Other subjects

Try your hand at other subjects too! Plants are really fun, especially with these Pigment Brush Pens – you can draw the stems and add leaves coming off them without the stems melting away.

Other ideas:

1. Flowers
2. Butterflies
3. Trees
4. Long skirts
5. Abstract art

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Multicolor leaves

This is the other video mentioned with multiple colored leaves….

Store owners

Feel free to use these ideas as a demo make and take with your customers! Just do me a favor and give me credit, let folks know where they can get more art help 🙂 

I just saw eggs this week for $12 a dozen – crazy crazy crazy! And they say the price is only going to keep rising. So what do we do when Easter is around the corner? No more eggs? Decorate wooden or plastic ones? Well, I decided that I have a strategy that’ll help me create some beautiful eggs….but by preparing them all NOW even if not decorating til later in April.

NOTE: In addition to today’s video, there are two other egg videos at the end of this post to inspire your Easter crafting!

Tutorial: Get started extra early for Easter egg crafts!

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!

Coloring with Pigment Brush Pens

These markers dry permanent unless using the blending solution with them, giving you lots of options! I let colors keep drying between layering so the underlying lighter layers stayed in place while the other colors ended up on top. They’re transparent colors, too, so you won’t cover and block them like an opaque pen would.

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Other ideas?

I’ll be making a few other eggs for samples for the show. Got ideas that I should try? I’m trying for an art-theme!

Pysanky Eggs part 1

This older video shows how to make tone-on-tone eggs by etching.

Pysanky Eggs part 2

This older video shows how to make more traditional colorful pysanky.

I now bring you part 2 in this series of revisiting the Staedtler Pigment Brush Pens that I brought to your attention a few months ago! They’re a water-based pen that becomes permanent when dry – so we can use that feature of its properties to create some gorgeous layering to create very simple, pretty flowers. Staedtler sent me a package with the full line of the 60 colors, so I’m putting them to good use!

Tutorial: Transparent Flowers

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!

Plenty of water, little pigment

Create paper-thin looking petals by placing a nice amount of water on the paper, then letting the color just zoom into the wet puddle by touching it just barely to the edge.

Color will flow out into the whole petal – so when you start, use less than you think you need until you see how it dries. Too much color and the transparency might look more like mud instead.

Let them dry

After finishing the first petal and leaf, let the paper completely dry so you can freely paint other petals without worry. The Staedtler Pigment Brush Pens will dry entirely and any water painted on top won’t disturb them at all!

NOTE: If you use their Multi Ink liquid blender, that WILL lift the color underneath. 

ANOTHER NOTE: If you use a different type of water-based marker that isn’t permanent when dry, be very careful and don’t smooch the brush around ANY more than necessary. Lifting the underlying petals will wreck the effect of the layered transparency.

Make the flowers different

Create layered shapes and flower sizes that feel different – tilt one to the left and one to the right at slightly different angles off of 90 degrees so it won’t look overly planned. That’ll help the flowers look like they’re growing naturally. 

Try adding more petals to one of them so it’ll have the look of tilting more toward the viewer – forward-most petals will get a little shorter than the earlier ones painted in.

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Vary the value, but just barely

Value is the difference betwen light and dark; don’t get too crazy with value, but the more each petal has its own light and transparency, the more interesting it will be to look at!

A few months ago I showed you some Staedtler Pigment Brush pens – water-based markers that become permanent once dry. You might  remember this one:

I was tickled to find out that while I was working on a freelance design project for one of Staedtler’s satellite offices, HQ saw it and was impressed. So much so they wanted to send me a pack of promo goodies! 

It was so nice to hear their appreciation of my work; and though I didn’t know what would be in this promo pack, I looked forward to it. Just before Christmas a BIG box arrived, and I put it under the tree – so I’d have something to open on Christmas morning. Not only did I find the full line of 60 marker colors in it – they also included a 24-pack and a 12 pack of portrait colors – so read on for the giveaway later in this post!

Tutorial: Do these markers bleed through? (paper tests)

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!

Student grade watercolor paper

For years I’ve recommended student grade watercolor papers for water-based markers. There’s just something about how they “cling” to anything with too much cotton in them, so something a little slipperier is warranted to help the color move more easily. 

I didn’t fuss over streaks – because I chose a subject that I could use the marker lines to my advantage. Always think about that when choosing a subject for a medium – or your medium for a subject. Some things are just better for one or the other.

In this case the veins were calling me….my neighbor thought I was crazy when I asked if I could take a photo of her houseplant, and proceeded to move it closer to the window and cleared a shelf for myself. HA! I knew I could also capture the thin stems of the plant, and tiny leaves. These markers have a nice small brush for that kind of detail.

There was zero bleed through on the back, which would be pretty obvious if you know this paper – it’s pretty thick!

Marker paper

While marker paper tends to be more slippery, it also isn’t made to have any flow; it’s not soft enough OR hard enough! (It would be FABULOUS for lettering with these pens though!) 

To simulate a blend, there’s a few possibilities:

-create a line of a dark color, and next to it a line of a midtone, then a line of a light, and let the viewer’s eye “mix” it for them. You’d be surpised how well a graphic approach like that comes across to a person looking at your art!

-use blending liquid to smooth out areas – even just the larger ones that are large enough to wield a brush in them.

-pull out the colored pencils after it’s dry! Colored pencils love working on top of any flood of color, since the white speckles typically left behind are pre-covered by the marker ink, so blending is easier.

And after all the application of color, it’s pretty awesome this doesn’t bleed through. 

Cheap coloring book paper

While the cheap paper Amazon prints on can work fine with colored pencils and alcohol markers (though marker bleeds like mad, so choose books printed on only one side)……the streakiness is pretty much off the charts! I couldn’t get the blending liquid to work at all on it. 

Nicer coloring book paper

There’s much more possibility with a higher end paper. Streakiness is still present if the spaces are large, but much more controllable. Wide open areas is where it’s mostly in danger of showing marker lines.

Kanoko Egusa’s style is one I love, primarily because it has both small details and open enough areas to have fun coloring. Might not be best for this particular marker though.

As I said before though, with practiced lines it’s possible to make the lines on a large space like the face look like muscle. Blending liquid had some efficacy so try it out – but as always be sure you test in your own coloring book to see how different mediums will perform. 

Nicer coloring book paper, smaller designs

If you’re a Johanna Basford fan, her work is really suited for these pens! Lots of tiny areas that you can cover quickly and easily with the pigment brush markers, and the fine details can be easily handled with the fine marker tip.

No bleeding through means you won’t lose any of the back sides of any pages! 

Giveaway!

Staedtler sent me extra markers, and I’m thrilled to be able to get them out to some lucky folks to try out! And I’d like to target each of them to someone who will actually use them, so do me a favor and check off all three items on this list, okay? I’d hate to pay all that shipping cost to send out a pack you won’t touch! 

To qualify to WIN, do all three:

1. Leave a comment – and tell me which of the two sets of markers would work for you! Even though the “portrait” set is called portrait, it’d be fabulous for animals too!
2. Sign up for my e-newsletter below; it’s free! It comes out every Saturday and I let you know what’s posted that week, so you won’t miss out on any creativity. Or the winner announcement next weekend!
3. Subscribe to my YouTube channel! I mean cmon. Seriously. It’s free, too, right?

I’ll be picking winners on Friday night and will include the winners’ names in the newsletter. Go tell a friend or two about the giveaway, you probably know someone who likes using markers!

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