Leaf Ghost #249

Today’s ghost technique was something I wasn’t at all sure would work. But JetPens assured me it was a thing, and I trust them.

Back during Ghost Week I used watercolor paint with a dip pen, and it worked as well as ink. But the paint back in June was from a tube, mixed with water in a small cup. So dipping the nib into it was pretty much the same as using ink.

As ghost fans already know, lately I’ve been doing a lot of work with gansai watercolors from pans. They’re beautiful, but there isn’t really a convenient way to dip a nib into a shallow pan. That’s where JetPens’ helpful suggestion entered the picture: use a brush to load paint onto the nib.

Assuming I would need to have a flat space on my left for the paint, I had to wait until the last model cleared the table in my art space. However, once I was underway I found that the pen needed reloading infrequently enough that it wasn’t a huge interruption to switch hands while refilling. So I could keep the paint to my right, a lucky thing because the portable easel I had on the table was being difficult.

The previous watercolor pen combo used two colors at two different line widths. This time I kept all the line widths narrow but used four colors (Ultramarine and Ultramarine Pale in back, Sap Green Deep and Sap Green in front). The result was exactly the combination I like: lighter colors with distinct differences in the background, darker colors with lower contrast for the leaf.