Leaf Ghost #175

Yet another snow day provides time for yet another leaf ghost.

This one continues techniques tested in #172. While that one didn’t have enough water, this one had a bit too much. Perhaps next time I’ll find a happy medium.

I used hot press illustration board this time, which worked much better than the Bristol board from #172. If nothing else, it was thick enough that slicing the masking film didn’t cut all the way through. Plus the water didn’t warp it at all.

The ink is new too: Shikiori Yamadori “Copper Pheasant.”

Leaf Ghost #174

Like #169, the ink here just kinda turned into a puddle of squish. Either the tan sketchbook paper isn’t as absorbent as I thought, or the technique just isn’t working.

Leaf Ghost #173

In case anyone’s interested about what goes into a Poe ghost, they’re created by alternating between pens with different line widths (0.7mm in blue, 0.35mm in grey) and different ink colors (red with tape on the ends, black without).

The text for this ghost must have been the set-up episode that runs when it isn’t sweeps month. The major event on this page is the nameless narrator tripping and almost falling into a hole.

Leaf Ghost #172

A few ghosts ago I got some unexpected results from ink on mixed media paper. Since then I’ve been playing around with ways to apply water to an inked surface. Today I decided to try another drawing based on what I found.

Working on bristol board, I created the same chessboard pattern as #169. Then I masked off the non-leaf part and sprayed the surface with a mist of water.

Results were mixed but suggest future potential. I used a brand of masking film I’d never tried before, and I found it difficult to cut. Maybe my knife wasn’t as sharp as it should have been, but I found it impossible to slice the film without cutting through the board underneath. Also my experiments suggested that a light spray of water would more than do the trick. Here I think I should have used a bit more.

Try try again.

Leaf Ghost #171

I couldn’t resist the invitation to add an old Mel Brooks joke to Poe’s text. You’ll find it in the second row starting at the end of the first line.

This is also the first time I’ve done two Poe ghosts in a row. They’re easy to do a row at a time, which means I can draw part of one and then come back to it the next time I have a spare minute (or spare 20 minutes or so, which is how long rows typically take). So even when I don’t have enough free time to do another kind from start to finish, I can keep a Poe ghost going.

Leaf Ghost #170

“The Pit and the Pendulum” continues.

The experiment here is the inclusion of a few holes, replicating the leaf in the source photo. The biggest one is at the intersection of rows two and three, column three. But there are some others here and there.