Dr. Martins Bombay Indian Ink try-out.

My son bought me a set of 12 of these coloured inks. (Including black and white). I've used them a little in some of my mixed media pics, but thought I'd try using them on their own. I hope this is of some interest. I've not used coloured inks before so this is a finding my way exercise. This is in my A3 sketchbook, I was hoping it would cope with the ink...it does most things. I've done three sketches, trying slightly different things each time. Here's the pic... THE GIRL....My objective here was to draw with a waterproof black pen (05), and then apply the ink to see if it degraded my pen lines. Adding colour with watercolour sometimes does, and I have to go over the pen lines again. So this was just adding flat colour and painting straight over my pen lines. I was very pleased with the result (not talking about the drawing, just the way the ink worked). The lines on the face remained crisp and solid. THE GNOME-LIKE CREATURE ON THE RIGHT....here I tried a little colour mixing, and applying ink and then using a brush with clean water to blend and play with the ink to see what happen. Again, it was on top of the black ink drawing and it needed no re-working with the pen. So pleased with the process again. THE OLD MAN...tried a little more blending of colours, allowing the ink underneath to dry first. The main reason for this character was to see how the ink coped with the beard. I'd painted a mixed grey ink to represent the mid-shadows within the beard, and was hoping to add white highlights and threads of hair using the Bombay white indian ink. A little optimistic. I could have used gouache to improve the beard, but that wasn't the point of this sketch...so the beard hasn't worked. The grey block with white lines is just me seeing what happens with a darker grey, and then white ink stroked over it when dry. A slight improvement. Conclusions so far....I really like this ink. Mostly all I want to do is draw. My colour pictures are little more than coloured drawings...I suppose many paintings are, but more-so in my case. It's illustration that floats my boat, and these may well turn into a favorite medium. Can't think why I haven't tried them before. With white over dark and not so dark colour, I'm back to leaving areas of white paper, or using gouache. This is just sketch-book play, I'm keen to try in it on better paper...I'll post anything I do. I realise many will have used this media, but it's all new to me. Maybe there's a few tips pending. Lew.

Thanks David. I could have worked a little more on the beard, put the darker areas in, but the sketch was about seeing what happened with the inks. What's interesting to me is that my pen drawing under the ink is still registering, even the fine lines. That's what I was hoping for, so I guess it's a good result.

That's interesting, Carol. Dr Martin's media is new to me. I'm liking the colored indian ink, I'll have to look up the concentrated watercolour. I experimented once with ordinary watercolour used with a pen, and wasn't impressed with the result...however 'concentrated' watercolour sounds like it might work.

Thanks Carol. I'm not sure I'm qualified to recommend these inks. I got them as a gift. When I looked them up on google, I saw that they had very good reviews. I'm finishing an all-ink picture using better quality paper at the moment. Slightly mixed results...I'll post it later...I still like the ink very much, it's just a matter of getting used to it. I'm tending the use it as I use watercolour, and I've had mixed results with that. (I should point out that I'm not a 'traditional' watercolourist.)

I've been working on a second experiment with these inks. I was intending to do a little more on it, but think I've learned enough from this picture. It's a very simple idea, I've done it on Daley Rowney mixed media paper, 250gsm, which has proven fine for most of what I do...it tends to be mixed media anyway. Here's the line drawing I made (waterproof pen 06). The idea is to use fairly flat color for a definite illustrative result (illustration being my first love). I was about to block in the girls hair with flat black, but decided to draw the hair, thinking if I don't like it and can always block it in later. The three panels behind her is a device often used in illustration...sometimes flat colour, sometimes with pattern or texture etc. So the aim is flat colour on the girl, the panels will have some kind of gradient with a 'paint-brushy' look, and the faint suggestion of a cloud going across the two right hand panels. (Not shown in the drawing, because I didn't want ink-outlines round the clouds.) I'm hoping once the colour is on that I won't have to rework the pen lines, although this is no big deal. So a very simple, almost 'painting by numbers' concept. (Well, that was the plan.) Here's the painting as far as I'm going to take it...it was 'INTERESTING'...and hasn't turned out as I'd hoped. Nothing new there, that's often to case with my pictures. I started with the three panels, the left and right to be similar with a brushy gradient look, the middle panel the same with different colours. Problems almost straight away. Where I laid on ink with the brush, and then tried to blend and or soften the colour it dried with 'lines'. In the middle panel near the top, close to the girl's hair, is an obvious one. Once it has dried, I couldn't brush it out...the ink is waterproof once dry. I didn't notice this at first. Then I started the girl's face...my 'flat' colour dried with these 'lines' all over it. She looked like she had some kind of dreadful disease. Once dry, I quickly went over the face, with a slightly darker tone. This got rid of most of the lines (I put the ink on really quickly...slightly diluted). But now the face was too dark. So I went over it again with diluted white ink, hoping to lighten it. Now, it looked like the disease she'd caught earlier was terminal...but in fact it dried as you see it...a bit blotchy, but not nearly so bad as it first looked. I carried on fiddling with the whole painting in much the same way, I'm not sure how many layers I put on...the one thing that impressed me was that no matter how I mis-treated the ink, it remains very vibrant. A lot of the fiddling was around the cloud, which was meant to be a 'suggestion' of a cloud. Obviously, with all these layers going on, the original pen drawing DID need reworking...the least of my troubles. A right mess. So all in all, a duffer. But I think I learned at lot, and realize I can't really treat this ink like watercolour, at least, not in the way I paint watercolour. I'm still impressed with the ink, and shall try to get the hang of it. In case you aren't clear about what I was after...here's a pic where I added the girls' colour digitally. I wasn't expected so smooth a look, but this is more like my aim. (Maybe, as I have the drawing, I could try a digital version at some time). So, it's back to the drawing board folks.

Carol, I dampened the first panel I painted as I do with watercolour. I got the lines. I tried not dampening the next panel...same result. It sometimes happens with watercolour, but that, not being waterproof, can be corrected. Oddly, I seemed to get a better result the first time I used it in my sketchbook. That's smooth, 170 gsm, as opposed to the 250 gsm of my multi-media paper. I may have another go in my sketchbook. Maybe I need different paper. I'm sure you're right about the learning curve, Margaret. I didn't like acrylics because they dry so quickly.