CHAPTER 1 USING DIFFERENT MEDIA AND TOOLS
This opening chapter will define the tools and media used throughout this book. It introduces you to some of the media available and their basic characteristics. Once you choose a style direction and technique to pursue, you will need to experiment and practice to achieve a quality of work that is both professional and consistent.
Dry media such as charcoal, graphite, colored pencils, and pastels are the most common and readily available media with which to draw. Because fashion accessories come in such a vast range of textures and surfaces, you should look for a medium that best describes the finish and fabrication of the object as simply as possible.
CHARCOAL
This is the blackest and most traditional of the dry media. It can be somewhat difficult to control for detailed drawings and challenging to keep clean, but there is nothing more rich and expressive than a charcoal line. Charcoal comes in various grades and forms that progress from very hard, typically 2H, to very soft, such as 6B. It is better to use softer grades because you can always lessen your hand pressure for lighter tones, whereas a hard pencil can never be darker than its grade.
The alligator handbag was drawn with charcoal pencil and used for a retail advertisement.
CHARCOAL PENCILS
Charcoal pencils are wood- or paper-wrapped covered sticks of charcoal that can be sharpened in a pencil sharpener or with a knife. They are used for expressive lines and general drawing.
VINE CHARCOAL
Vine or willow charcoal has a soft gray tone. It is more fragile than regular charcoal and can be easily rubbed or erased away.
COMPRESSED CHARCOAL
Compressed charcoal comes in short blocks or stick form. Its deep black color makes it excellent for laying down large areas of tone or for smearing.
POWDERED CHARCOAL
Powdered charcoal is charcoal in powder form that can be padded or rubbed down with a foam pad or chamois. It is also used for pattern and stencil work.
Graphite is a gray-colored medium enhanced by its shiny surface. It is very controllable and erases easily as long as you do not press too hard into the paper. It comes in a wide assortment of grades from 9H, the hardest, to 9B, the softest. It is also available in a variety of forms.
Graphite pencils allow maximum control when rendering textured surfaces, as with this nylon boot.
GRAPHITE PENCILS
Graphite pencils are wood-cased graphite cores that can easily be sharpened in a pencil sharpener or with a knife. They can be used for everything from fast sketching to the finest detailed work.
WOODLESS GRAPHITE
Woodless graphite consists of cylinders of graphite covered with a thin layer of plastic that can be sharpened in a sharpener or by hand. This is excellent for emotional linework as well as for laying down large areas of tone.
GRAPHITE STICKS OR BLOCKS
Graphite sticks or blocks are larger rectangles of graphite that are good for covering large areas with tone or making texture rubbings.
GRAPHITE LEADS
Graphite leads can be purchased in thin, woodless sticks that can be inserted into a metal or plastic mechanical lead holder. These are typically used for extra-fine detail and drafting.
POWDERED GRAPHITE
Powdered graphite comes in a jar; it can be rubbed down to create a solid dark gray tone or applied with a soft cloth or pad to create subtle toning.
WATER-SOLUBLE GRAPHITE
Water-soluble graphite can be used to draw in a conventional manner but also turns into a gray wash when applied with water and a soft brush.
Pastels are pure pigment held together with a binder. They come in endless color options and can be used for line drawing, value lay-down, or color fills. They are made in a variety of sizes, from pencils to large sticks. Their quality can also vary, from finer portrait pastels to sidewalk chalk. Pastels can be applied with your fingers, sponges, bristle brushes, or chamois.
This green satin pump on black paper was drawn using a hatching technique.
SOFT PASTELS
Soft pastels are the most common pastels and have multiple uses. They cover easily and blend well to achieve realistic light gradations and color variation. They tend to be dusty and can be hard to use for fine detail.
SEMI-HARD PASTELS
Semi-hard pastels have more binder in them and are usually baked. They are good for linework as well as detailing. Some brands are so hard that they can be used as blocks of paint like watercolors and can be applied with a soft, wet brush.
OIL PASTELS
Oil pastels contain an oil base that makes them dustless when they are applied. They are harder to control for detail, but can be used with solvents to turn them into a more painterly medium.
Colored pencils are a popular medium because they can be controlled easily and work well when used with other media. Colored pencils come in different quality grades; it is important to use a professional grade when executing serious art. Colored pencils are easy to overlay and can be used in linear styles or smooth blended finishes.
This thick-soled shoe was drawn in colored pencil. Marker was then applied to the back of the paper to soak through, giving the piece its dense, rich colors.
STUDIO OR THICK-CORE COLORED PENCILS
These are best used for drawing line and filling in. They come in a variety of colors and are fairly easy to erase if you have not scored the paper with too much pressure.
BLENDER COLOR PENCIL
A blender pencil is a colorless colored pencil. It is a stick of the pigment binder with no pigment, designed for smoothing and blending colored pencils together once they are applied to paper.
COLORED PENCIL STICKS
These are the core of a colored pencil with no outside casing surrounding them. They are great for laying down large areas of color or stippling big areas.
SEMI-HARD COLORED PENCILS
These are insoluble, harder-core colors that are best for fine line and detail work. They work best on semi-smooth paper.
Wet media can offer some of the most stunning visual results, but can also be the most difficult to control and the least forgiving to work with because of their transparent nature. You therefore need to consider the extra time needed to master their beauty and unpredictable character. The cheaper the supplies you buy, the more difficult they will be to work with.
WATERCOLOR
You will need a good watercolor brush, a decent quality of paint, and the right paper, depending on how you like to work. Brushes can be limp or springy in nature. Paint can be applied in controlled, layered washes or bold, loose brushstrokes, and paper can be absorbent or resistant to the paint depending on the amount of “sizing” in it (see Watercolor paper, page 20). Try a few different combinations until you find what works for you. Watercolor comes in various forms and each has its advantages and disadvantages.
This shoe was drawn on two-ply Bristol using cake watercolors.
WATERCOLOR TUBE PAINT
Watercolor tube paint is a semi-liquid form. The medium is ready to use; all you need is some water to achieve the right consistency for your choice of style. These paints can be difficult to mix accurately when a specific color story is required, but they are the easiest with which to achieve consistent color when applied.
CONCENTRATED WATERCOLOR
Concentrated watercolors are 100% liquid paints with a chemical or extra-fine pigment base. They are typically brighter than tube or cake forms, and are easy to mix with the eye dropper with which many brands are supplied. They are less permanent and will bleed into each other if you overlay them. You can also use them directly in drawing pens and airbrushes. They are known for sometimes separating into slight color variations, as in the swatch above.
WATERCOLOR CAKES OR BLOCKS
Watercolor cakes or blocks are the most common form of the medium. The cakes are basically the tube form dried into a block shape. The paint can be easily revived with water and mixed for color matching. This is not the easiest way to work if color matching is important. Dry paint can also be picked up with a damp brush.
WATERCOLOR PENCILS
Watercolor pencils have become a popular way of using the medium in the past few years and the quality of the pigment in them has increased dramatically. They are easy to control, but it can be hard to achieve deep color values. They can also leave you with a slight hatch line from the drawing process that may not dissolve completely. The best results seem to be when they are scribbled down on a separate sheet similar to a palette and used in the same manner as cake watercolors.
Because they do not bleed or soak through paper, water-based markers can be used for fine line and finishing details on top of Xylene or alcohol-based markers. They can also be dissolved with water and a soft brush, which creates a loose dramatic effect resembling the characteristics of watercolor. Since they dry quickly and do not blend easily they are difficult to gradate and keep smooth. They come in a variety of pen tips including chisel, fine point, and brush tip.
This large rose hat was drawn with waterbased pens; a soft watercolor brush was then used to dissolve the line and give it a loose, washed effect.
The swatches above offer a basic example of a water-based brush tip pen and a fine-line marker, both when laid down directly and when dissolved with water.
This brush and ink drawing by Young Kim demonstrates the drama and gesture available through this traditional medium.
This black ink drawing on yellow paper demonstrates the dramatic line qualities you can achieve with a solid black line.
INK
India ink is an intense black ink that offers a dramatic and classic look to art. It can be used with drawing pen points, calligraphy nibs, brushes, or sticks. It can be crosshatched or used in wash form to add tone or form to an object. Inks also come in a variety of colors that are usually permanent and can be airbrushed without thinning.
There are also pigment-based ink pens that give transparent colored lines. These are excellent for detailed work and technical drawings.
Ink pen
Pigment ink pen
Usually thought of as an office supply, a ballpoint pen will offer a wide variety of line as well as subtle hatching.
This drawing was done with ballpoint pen on hot press bristle board and accented with charcoal pencil and transparent markers.
GOUACHE
Gouache is opaque water-based paint. It was the standard medium for colored illustration work during the golden era of illustration in the 1940s, ′50s, and ′60s. It is still popular in some design fields and as a fine art medium because of its extreme matte finish. Because it mars and chips easily, it is no longer widely used for commercial work. It is good for laying down flat areas of pure color, and when used in a washed style it produces a modeled-looking texture. It can be airbrushed or applied with a soft hair brush. To create form on an object, simply use some watered-down paint and lightly brush over, or hatch on, the undercoat color, tinting it to the desired tone.
Gouache
The cyber smoker was painted on illustration board using soft brushes for the figure work and an airbrush for the smoking heart.
The featured figure piece demonstrates a faster line drawing style that communicates the clothing while leaving room for the fantasy of fashion.
This highly stylized illustration by Diana Garrett is drawn with alcohol marker and pigment fine- line pens on Bristol board.
SOLVENT-BASED MARKERS
Art markers come in two popular solvents: alcohol and Xylene. There is no real difference between the two except that Xylene tends to offer a slightly slower drying time together with a more intense smell, which many artists prefer not to suffer through. Markers can be purchased in a multitude of colors, which makes them a popular medium for commercial artists. They dry quickly and are easily transported for in-house freelance work. They can be combined with dry media and can offer both loose and tightly rendered art styles. They work best on marker paper that is specially made to take markers and enhance their transparent beauty.
These swatches demonstrate different ways of gradating with markers.
The gold swatch was gradated using a colorless blender marker to draw out the tone. The stippling technique below it uses three different tones, light, medium, and dark blue. The deep orange swatch was created using three different values of marker beginning with a pale flesh, then medium orange, then finally burgundy. All swatches were applied wet onto wet.
Acrylic paint has taken off where gouache could not go. It is a durable water-based paint that dries quickly and does not mar easily. It can be used as flat color, for overlapping washes, or in thick painterly styles. It can be sprayed through an airbrush or applied with nylon brushes. It is easy to correct because it can be used in an opaque manner to cover mistakes.
The swatches above demonstrate the traditional painterly quality of acrylic as well as the dimensional illusion created by airbrushing.
This celebrity portrait of Bette Davis was painted with an airbrush using acrylic paint. Graphite pencil was then used for the face details.
There is a large variety of papers for artists to choose from. You will need to try different manufacturers as well as different kinds of papers to make the right choice for your specific medium and style direction. Most media have papers that are made especially for their particular characteristics, such as pastel, charcoal, markers, and watercolor; however, don’t be afraid to experiment to find something that is unique to you. Most papers come in single sheets, pads, or rolls, in a vast array of colors from tainted whites to solid black. You will also find some papers described as “archival.” This means that they are museum-quality and will not deteriorate over time. Archival papers are preferable if you are planning to make fine art pieces that will need to last permanently.
There are two basic criteria to consider when choosing a paper: surface texture and paper weight.
Watercolour paper with concentrated watercolor
Marker paper with alcohol marker and blender marker
Rough paper with compressed charcoal
SURFACE TEXTURE DEFINITION
Vellum or cold press finishes are slightly textured or have a “tooth” to them. They are excellent for working in dry media such as pencil, charcoal, pastel, or some paint media.
Plate or hot press finishes are smooth and work best for ink, pen line, or any style requiring a clean, smooth edge to a finished line.
Some papers refer to their surfaces as “rough” finish—as with certain watercolor papers. Try not to use a paper so rough that it creates texture where you do not want it or that changes the surface character of the item being illustrated. Rough textures also tend to allow media to settle into their “pits,” which can look grainy and change the texture of an accessory.
PAPER WEIGHTS
Papers come in different weights that affect their stiffness, transparency, and brightness. You will need to try a few brands to see what works best for your needs. First read the covers of the pads to understand if they are for wet or dry media only. A paper that is too thin will buckle with wet media. If you work on a very translucent paper you will need to mount your illustrations to another paper or board when finished so the correct values are displayed and your piece does not appear too flimsy to handle.
WATERCOLOR PAPER
Watercolor paper is specifically meant for heavy water use, so the weights are much heavier than regular drawing paper. It also contains “sizing,” which affects how the paper absorbs or resists water. It can be purchased in single sheets, pads, rolls, or block form. A block is a pre-stretched pad of papers mounted on a backing board and sealed on all four sides with a rubber or plastic border. Stretched papers are necessary when working with a lot of water in your style so your work will not buckle while painting. Try not to work in anything lighter than a 140lb weight unless you stretch your paper first.
TRACING OR PARCHMENT PAPER
Tracing paper, also referred to as “onionskin,” comes in pads or roll forms. It is a translucent paper with various surface textures that is used mostly for underdrawings, overlays, and conceptual planning. There are some artists who have developed finished styles using tracing paper because of the unique way that it takes various media.
SKETCHING, DRAWING, AND BOND PAPERS
These papers are used for most basic drawing needs. They are the kind of papers used in most sketchbooks and come in a wide range of pad sizes, weights, textures, and colors.
MARKER PAPER
There are different types of marker paper. Many are slick with lots of sizing in them and are made so the marker floats on the top surface. Most of the pieces shown in this book were drawn on Bienfang Graphics 360 marker paper, which is a 100% cotton paper. When using Graphics 360 marker paper, coloring can be done on the back of the paper, which has less sizing than the front and is therefore more absorbent, helping achieve a smooth, even tone. Other papers may work like this too, so experiment with what is available to you.
Tracing paper with graphite stick
Bristol board with colored pencil
Hot press paper with colored pencil stick
Sketch-bond paper with chalk pastel
Newsprint with charcoal pencil
Vellum with pastel pencil
BRISTOL BOARD
Bristol is a thicker drawing paper that commonly comes in 2-, 3-, and 4-ply weights. It also comes in both vellum and smooth textures and, because of its sturdiness, it works well for both dry and wet media. It is also excellent for mounting finished illustrations done on thinner paper for presentation purposes.
NEWSPRINT
Newsprint is usually the most economical type of paper to work on, as it is typically made from recycled materials. It is not archival and will turn yellow within a few months of use. For this reason, it is not usually suitable for finished, professional work.
ACETATE OR CLEAR FILM
Acetate or clear film is a completely transparent sheet or roll of cellulose used for protecting finished art, stenciling or masking for airbrush work, or for adding overlays to finished drawings. It also comes in a frosted version that can take ink, paint, or marker without crawling. It comes in a range of weights from very thin (.001) to extra- heavy (.020).
COVER STOCK OR CARDSTOCK
Cover stock or cardstock is a thicker paper (80lb or more) that comes in many colors and can be used for dry or wet media.
DECORATIVE PAPERS
Decorative papers are either made by hand or have unique characteristics such as a print, fiber content, or texture. They may even have organic materials such as flower petals or leaves pressed within them.
FOAMBOARD
Foamboard is a sheet of polystyrene (Vk-tein thick) laminated on both sides with drawing stock paper. It is excellent for mounting presentation drawings.
POSTER BOARD
Poster board is a cheap, thick paper stock for mounting art.
TRANSFER PAPER
Transfer paper comes in various colors and is used for transferring preliminary drawings onto your final paper stock when the paper is too thick to see through.
Many of these tools are used to create the techniques shown throughout this book.
BRUSHES
When choosing a brush, make sure you consider what medium you will be using and what size is necessary for the work to be done. For the detailing or highlight work demonstrated throughout this book, you will need a round-ferrule pointed hair brush. Use a #1 or #0 for finer details, although you can go smaller if necessary. For painting with watercolor, try a round-ferrule pointed hair brush that is between #6 and #10. Find a brush that you are comfortable with, but remember that the smaller the brush, the more stroking you will have to do to fill an area; this can cause a watercolor, for example, to become overworked.
MECHANICAL PENCILS
Mechanical pencils are hollow, lead-holding pencil shafts that allow you to use your choice of lead hardness and to change them quickly.
PENS AND FINE-LINE PENS
Drawing pens come in several point sizes and nib shapes. There are fine points, chisel, broad tip, and brush pens.
CHAMOIS
Chamois is a soft, pliable piece of animal skin excellent for blending, smudging, or laying down tone on a drawing.
ERASERS
There are many erasers to choose from. A kneaded eraser allows you to “blot” or adjust the values of a drawing without having to remove a line or tone completely. You may also choose to invest in an electric eraser that allows you to remove large areas of tone or extensive linework easily. Make sure before you use it that your eraser’s consistency will not destroy your paper’s surface.
TORTILLONS OR STUMPS
Tortillons or stumps are spiral-wound soft paper tools used for blending charcoal, graphite, and pastels. They come in different hardnesses and sizes and can be sharpened with an artist’s knife.
FRENCH CURVES
There are various shapes and sizes of French curve. They give a solid smooth-drawn edge to curved shapes.
TRIANGLES
Triangles are angled, straight-edged tools that come in two standard shapes: 45/90 degrees, and 30/60/90 degrees.
CIRCLE TEMPLATES AND ELLIPSE GUIDES
Circle templates and ellipse guides are thin plastic stencils used for drawing accurate, clean-edged circles and ellipses.
TEMPLATES FOR JEWELRY
Start with a center line on which to position the template. Then use a medium black pen line to outline the stone’s silhouette. Use a finer pen line for the inside facets, focusing toward the center line.
HIGHLIGHT PAINT
White paint can be used for highlights. It provides the strong contrast desirable for most commercial work. For opaque highlights, you can use white gouache, Pro White paint, or Dr. Ph. Martin’s Bleedproof White. All of these paints are water-based and can be thinned for various tones. Dr. Ph. Martin’s is popular because it helps prevent any color underneath from bleeding through.
SPRAY ADHESIVE
Spray adhesive is a spray-on glue that allows you to mount a drawing onto a presentation board without your work wrinkling.
WORKABLE FIXATIVE
Workable fixative is a spray-on coating used to seal finished illustrations; it allows you to go back and make corrections if necessary because of the slight tooth it leaves behind.
LIGHT TABLE OR BOX
This is a flat drawing surface illuminated from below that allows you to transfer an underdrawing onto a thicker paper.
The diversity of user-friendly software programs available for today’s computers have made them one of the most common and usable tools for any artist. Although the techniques in this book primarily involve hands-on studio skills, you will find a variety of computer applications mentioned that were used to tweak or enhance the illustrated images. This tutorial is a very basic explanation of some of the most common tool terms found in all image-editing programs. The technology changes daily, so try to find your own special combination of software and apps to make your art as individual as you are.
SHAPES AND OBJECTS
In a photo-editing program, use a masking tool to create basic shapes (indicated with dotted lines), then turn the shapes into “objects.” Once the objects are enclosed, they can be filled using a fill tool. You can fill an object with solid color or a variety of gradations as well as prints or textures. Gradations with colors come in “steps.” The lower the number of steps, the more lines you will see in the tone; the more steps, the smoother the gradation will look. A common dpi setting for a printable image is 300dpi.
LAYERS
You can overlap or layer as many shapes or objects as needed. You can also order shapes to the front or drop shapes behind others. This makes it easy to keep a clean edge. Here, intense light and dark tones were used to capture the reflective facets of this jewel. Smaller facets were added to enhance the prism feel of the crystal.
TRANSPARENCY, COPY, AND PASTE
You can use “transparency” to adjust white surface reflections to 50 or 70%. This will give the gem depth and sparkle. Use “copy” and “paste” to make repetitive patterns. For the gold frame studding, one finished dome was created and then “copy” and “paste” were used to create one horizontal and one vertical solid line of domes. Once completed, those lines were copied and pasted to the other side.
OTHER EFFECTS
A brush tool set on “spray” effect can be used to spray some white glow over some of the white highlights. You can also add a quasar or two for added sparkle effect. The front surface reflection is a solid white shape with its transparency altered so it appears as if you are looking down into the gem.