inktober2017 day 1 A is for Axe

My aims for #inktober2017 is to try and improve my inking, maybe tighten up the way I get things done, and investigate some alternative approaches.

I'm quite stuck in my ways, I draw the thing in pencil, ink over it with Copic Ciao markers and Pigma Micron Graphic pens, then photograph it on my phone and import that photo into Photoshop elements 10. Sometimes when iCloud is behaving this is quite quick, other times I have to sync my phone, or email the image to myself.
Once in Photoshop elements I rotate the image, stick it into Black and White mode, and clean up. Once the clean up is done I'll reduce the size of the image and then export it.

So here's a couple of short videos about how that process works. I'll do the same at the end of October and see how I've improved :)

Inktober 2016 first post

Inked

Cleaned

Colour

Toned

Inktober 2015

This year to make a change from the mad dash of doing 24HCD I thought I might try to join in #Inktober.
31 inked drawings in 31 days.

Inktober was instigated by Jake Parker in 2009  as a challenge to improve his already very refined inking skills.

The rules as with 24HCD are simple:

1. Draw something and ink it up.

2. Post it online. (I'll be posting here and on twitter)

3. Apply the hashtag  #inktober

4. Do this everyday throughout October.

I also have a vague notion that I might try and develop a story with the pictures... the joy of doing Inktober as against 24HCD is I can plan a story beforehand without breaking the rules.
This is a good thing, as the stories in my previous 24HCD efforts have been a little flimsy at times...

30 drawing apps in 30 days - day 22 INKredible

This is really a note taking app in fact I think it used to be called Notes Plus?

Anyway by default you get a standard fountain pen, with settings for wetness and size.. which means you can drawlike Ralph Steadman.

Or you could if the algorithm that turns your line into a line on the screen was a little bit more predictable... several times I managed to lose a line, or select an area instead of drawing a line.

The toolbar is simple, and can be hidden or pinned to the page, there are additional pens at additional cost, and various different paper types, that are more of interest to note takers. Pinch to zoom works without issue as long as you are in the right mode, and there's even a funny little zoom box thing- no idea why you'd use it.

There are a couple of odd settings, like the switch to pen after using the eraser, and this caught me out a couple of times. There's no fill.

There are however proper undo and redo buttons.

Export is to photo gallery as a .png, mail or to a printer.

...and that's about it.

I like it when it does what I want it to, but its all too easy to select and area rather than drawing what I want, and I don't want to change my behaviour to fit an app.

Draw a penguin was the challenge, and I think the line is nice and expressive on the eye.

Been drawing

I spent the morning checking through all the files for the now long term project - Ninja Dinosaurs vs Pirate Robots. It looks like I have 33 pages drawn and inked and just 6 needing colouring. The plan is to try and finish the whole book over the Easter break and get it into the iBooks and Amazon stores. I needed a couple of sketches to add to the front pages so have been inking a page of stumpy versions of the characters.

#24HCD 2014 3 hrs in 3 pages down

Much to my surprise I've managed to cobble together enough of a story to thread through 24 pages...
I've blasted on and have three pages inked up, unfortunately as the drawings are sketched the gaps in the plot appear and pages get dropped to try and get things to make some sort of sense...
So according to the overview I'm a couple of pages short..
Looks like I'll be turning a couple of pages into Double Page Spreads!
I'm working on A3 pages, which means I can use the fast flowing Copic pens, the downside is I'm burning through ink, and have covered my hands with spilt ink already. It's a messy business.

B is for banner- inked up

I sketched up a couple of 'b is for battles' but they were all a bit too fiddly. I thought I'd go with what I had and ink up the banner pic. I'll add some colour tomorrow, and try and make the orcish chain mail look less like tie dye tee shirts.

Colour test

There's a bit of ink bleed from the black , but not too bad. I reckon if I let it 'cure' a little before colouring I should be ok.

I'll probably go through and ink everything, scan it, then colour, so if it goes horribly wrong I can do some colouring in Photoshop.

More axes

Day off today for Adam's graduation so I'm milling around the house at a bit of a loose end as we've got to nip down to brighton shortly. Anyway I pencilled and inked up a dwarf and axe for 'a' is for axe. I'll see how the paper takes watercolour inks, and how fast the Coptic ciao markers are.

I'm guessing they'll bleed as soon as I go near them with ink. That said I accidentally spilt some of the black ink on my hands and it's stained them pretty well.

Crush them with facts

Because I am so very very well organised, I have Monday's Wych wolf page up and sitting in the Comic Press queue already..
Because I am shortsighted, i am not using the time to get ahead of myself, and build a buffer, but to dally in the rockpools, and have a go at a guest strip for my chum Steve's "Policy Police' strip.

I've had a quick sketch and my version of the protagonists are now alive in glorious pencilovision..
I've got to knock out a couple of backgrounds, and then I'll knuckle down to the task.
Should have something by the end of the day with luck.

WychWolf part 1

I've posted the first page of the wychwolf story over on www.wychwolf.com

The Comic Press scripts should make it go live first thing on Monday morning.

This page was actually not the first I drew for the story, but came out of a desire to introduce the characters a little before we rolled into the main story.

For those who are interested, I drew the pencils with a cheap plastic retractable, on some DELETER comic book paper, and then inked using a DELETER Saji dip pen, and Number 4 ink.

Scanned into photoshop elements, as a 600dpi black and white image, coloured, and fiddled around with, before dropping back to 72dpi for the web.

Art supplies from http://www.dinkybox.co.uk/

The pages that follow have been inked and penciled using a variety of different paper and ink, and pen.

I'll try and record what was done with what, so I can pick out the ones that I like best... which at the minute seems to be a Staedtler pigment liner ink fibre tip.

Different strokes from incontinent pens

I've been playing with a variety of inks and pens.

My old trusty Rotring isograph 0.5mm gives good service, though like a small child it needs it's bottom wiped a fair bit, and causes a huge amount of mess in the process... I also have to cheat to get a variety of line weight when using it.

The same is true of the pigment fibre tips pens.. I have tried to get Pigma pens in the UK but no luck, the best I've found are PILOTs, the Edding ones are nice but run out too quickly ... they are also both complete buggers if I try to put a wash over the top, as they bleed.

My mixture of Manga inks seem to provide a solution, but are a bit gluey to put in the Rotring so I have to use a dip pen... The pic here is done with a DELTER SAJi nib, which doesn't quite give enough flex...and unfortunately seems to have a leaky bladder, causing ink blobs... sigh.

My old set of Waverley nibs (some inherited from the Victorian era and really quite ancient), give a good flex, but are hard to wield round the page.

So the experimentation continues, I've done 10 pages of the comic for the UK webcomix thing, and they'll all get tweaked through photoshop or mango studio...

Spend spend spend

Strangely in a time when the good ole postie isn't delivering letters to General public, my recent impulse purchases all turned up at once, making Alison suspicious at my spending...

Manga Studio, and set of inks from Dinkybox... oh and when I was up in London the other day judging an art competition CASS art was having a half price sale, so I bought a bag full of paper, and pigment pens.

Using Manga studio is like learning to drive a special japanese clown car, everything goes great and then suddenly you accidentally step on the brake, and gravy squirts you in the eye.

I have no idea where half the things I need are cunningly hidden, like the capacity to crop an image... I guess I'm dealing with pages rather than images. On the positive side it has some lovely pen nibs that squish and flex and make swooping curves.

I have continued my strict discipline of trying to draw some girls every day, and whilst a lot look like hogarthian gin fiends, with wonky eyes, I feel I am getting there slowly, and gradually gaining confidence, that I can bloomin' well draw anything I choose too. Todays effort done in manga studio is based on the devilishly masterful works of Mr Allison of the Scary go round, and lately the Bad machinery..http://www.scarygoround.com/ he is without peer in the sphere of drawing girls with slinky hip jeans and tattoos. (top pic photoshop, bottom pic mango sususudio)