Ear Worm – In Your Head

This wasn’t originally designed to be an ear worm. It’s an illustration I created for a sequential art project I’m working on. But I did sneak some song lyrics into it (and the song has been stuck in my head recently).

Leaf Ghost #137

Back to Copics. These are the same colors as Leaf Ghost #48 only reversed. And the shadow is Cool Grey 5.

Leaf Ghost #136

Same pens, same inks, this time on tan paper. Drop shadow done entirely with hatching using the narrower tip.

Leaf Ghost #135

Same inks and pens as #133, only with the colors reversed.

The experiment here was to do the drop shadow with lines while the work was in progress rather than using markers or watercolors at the end. Seemed to work. Would do again.

Leaf Ghost #134

I recently saw an exhibit at the Nelson about watercolor technique. I wish they’d do more of this sort of thing, as I found it interesting and inspirational. I was particularly fond of "Italian Hills" by Arthur Bowen Davies, so I thought I’d try applying his technique to a leaf ghost.

Ghost geometry produces a much different look and feel from a landscape, but it was still a fun experiment. This is also my first time working in mixed media with both watercolor (background) and gouache (foreground).

Leaf Ghost #133

So lots of firsts here.

The main one is the use of text as the main graphic element. Appropriately enough, the story is Poe’s “The Masque of the Red Death.” While working, I referred to the entry in It Takes Every Word, a lit anthology (complete with writing prompts) I put together and illustrated several years ago.

I used Winsor & Newton Deep Red and Black India loaded into Rapidograph tech pens (0.35 and 0.7 mm, one for each color for a total of four pens). I’ve used line width variation before, and I also used tech pens recently. But this is my first time combining colors and widths exactly this way.

Of course with the image also being a story, the only way to do it was to go line by line, copying the text and switching pens each time the hue or brightness changed. More than once I found myself wishing I was working with something less temperamental than tech pens.

This is also my first time working with pens on illustration board. I guess I could have used a sketchbook, but somehow I sensed that I might want this one to be more of a stand-alone.

One more first: I’d never used the same pen for the art and the caption at the bottom.

Leaf Ghost #132

Fans of the leaf ghost series may recognize this color combination from #105. However, this is Koh-I-Noor Scarlet rather than Winsor & Newton Deep Red.

So this ghost is an ink test, both to see whether the color was good and also whether cleanup would be easy. Yes and no.

The color is a darker red that looks a little like dried blood, which will make it perfect for an upcoming ghost. Unfortunately it was a colossal pain to clean off the dip pen nib. Neither water nor alcohol completely removed it, so I had to resort to paint thinner. And that makes it unusable for the future project I have in mind, because I’ll use tech pens for that and they’re hard enough to clean even when the ink isn’t stubborn.

But that’s okay. The W&N ink looks pretty much the same, and it dissolves easily with water.

Leaf Ghost #131

These are the same Copic colors as last time, only this time I applied them with the markers directly rather than with the airbrush tool.

I also alternated colors from row to row (more or less) rather than doing all of one color at once. I’ve noticed in the past that some markers tend to dry up a little after a few minutes of constant use, so I thought I’d see if giving them a break between rows might help. Turned out it didn’t make much difference. BG78 Bronze in particular weakened as I went (compare the upper left to the lower right), while the other background color (BG57 Jade) fared better.

Both the blues I used for the leaf stayed strong for the whole time. This is the difference I’d expect for two nearly identical hues and shades: B28 Royal Blue and B29 Ultramarine. They were much farther apart in the airbrushed ghost.

Also Ultramarine was the first color I chose, in honor of it being W&N’s color story of the week. The rest just naturally fell into place after testing what markers did and didn’t work with the new tool.

Leaf Ghost #130

I got a Copic marker airbrush tool for Christmas, and this is my first time using it for a leaf ghost. Overall I’m pleased with the results (other than the C9 grey, which kinda made a mess).

It’s interesting which markers work with the airbrush tool and which ones don’t. Even some of the markers I recently refilled (and which draw just fine) didn’t produce much with the new tool. Must have something to do with the way the pigments are put together.

This is also my first time using hot press illustration board for a project that requires masking. It was exactly what I was after, so expect to see it for more airbrush paintings in the future.

Leaf Ghost #129

Turning 58 has brought me mindful of where I was 40 years ago. I’d like to think that 18-year-old me would have taken some comfort in the knowledge that four decades hence I’d spend the morning drawing while it snowed outside and a partially-blind, tailless cat napped nearby.

The drawing itself involved tech pens, a tool I’ve largely avoided because they’re a pain to clean. But I was using them for another project, so waste not want not on the ink.

When I finished the cross-hatching, I thought the blue leaf looked a little more like it was cut out of the field of green rather than floating above it. So as an experiment I drew the shadows accordingly. I won’t make this a regular thing, but it was a fun experiment that I’ve been meaning to try for awhile now.

Oh, and the other project I used the tech pens for was learning to draw with the lettering set we recently purchased from ScrapsKC.

Leaf Ghost #128

Background reds from #122. Foreground yellows from last time, but the lighter squares are alternating Sunshine and Canary lines.

Leaf Ghost #127

I haven’t done much with Winsor & Newton’s Canary Yellow, at least in part because it’s so light that it can be a little hard to see when drawing with it. But it made a nice combination with Sunshine Yellow (which in this photo looks more brownish orange).

Kind of an odd-shaped leaf, too. It looks a little like a mitten.

Leaf Ghost #126

This one’s as notable for the “behind the scenes” as it is for the ghost itself.

Among the art supplies I recently stocked up on were ink refills for a couple of Copic markers that had gone dry. One was for C07 Cool Grey 7, and the other was for B06 Peacock Blue. The grey refilled and worked just fine, but the chisel nib on the blue marker still didn’t work even with added ink.

So not only did I learn how to refill markers, but I also learned how to change nibs. 

The color scheme is a continuation of the idea that the ghosts look their best when the foreground and background are complementary hues. The contrast between the two background shades should be strong, but the foreground shades should be closer together. In that spirit, the background is YR68 Orange and YR61 Spring Orange (or on my very old marker, Yellowish Skin Pink). Regardless of name, I think the latter marker is going to need a refill soon.

The foreground is the recently refilled B06 Peacock Blue and B05 Process blue. Row 3 column 3 and row 5 column 3 were both drawn with the new chisel tip, which created darker squares than the rest of the Peacock ink applied with the marker’s original brush nib.

Leaf Ghost #125

When I was a kid I drew with mechanical pencils almost exclusively, but I got out of the habit as an adult. Deciding to give them another try, I added some pencils and leads to the start-of-the-year art supply purchases. With some time away from work thanks to MLK Day and inclement weather closings, I figured now was a good time to take them out for a spin.

I’d never used any color other than graphite grey in a mechanical pencil before, so the red in this drawing was a new experience. I also got a set of blue leads, but they seemed super brittle when I tested them. So I’ll save those for sometime when I feel like I have a little more patience.

Nor did I have any idea how smudgy the drawing would get if I didn’t take any steps to avoid smudging it. The answer clearly is “smudgy.” As recently as last year that would have driven me crazy, but now it seems more like part of the fun of the process.

 

Leaf Ghost #124

Close to last time, but the background is Nut Brown and the shadow is a lighter shade of grey.

Leaf Ghost #123

New year, new paper. One of my purchases at our traditional post-Christmas art supply shopping expedition was a sketchbook of tan paper. I had some success in 2023 with grey paper, so I thought this might be fun as well.

Turns out to be right. I really like the way this one looks, especially with the black and deep red on the tan page. I’m definitely looking forward to doing more with this.

However, I note that it doesn’t photograph particularly well. I think the iPhone’s algorithms may be recognizing that there’s paper in the photos and trying to color correct to make the paper white. The result in the photo above is a murky grey appearance. The ghost’s “official portrait” is a little closer to the subject’s true colors, but even that one isn’t quite right. I’m super busy with the start of the semester upon me, but in the future when I do more work in this sketchbook I hope to have the time to do some color correction before posting photos.