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Dr. Martins Bombay Indian Ink try-out.
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Message
Posted
Would Bristol board work any better? The trouble with any cartridge paper is that it'll suck up the paint/ink - and if the ink dries quite fast anyway, which by comparison with watercolour it does tend to, that effect will be exaggerated. Another alternative might be hot-pressed watercolour paper. I haven't used YUPO paper, but I don't know if it'll take the strong ink lines. It's a guess on my part, but having seen someone work with it, I get the impression they would smudge very easily.
Posted
I've not used Bristol Board or YUPO paper. I'd had a look at it, the yupo seems quite lightweight, so I'm not sure about that. I'll get some Bristol board, it's not as expensive as I thought. It's a popular illustrator's surface, can't think why I haven't tried it before. Thanks Carol and Robert.
Posted
I finally found a website where an artist talks about the problems with ink, he loves the colors, but hated the hard lines left around the edges of each area of ink. It seems it's part of the package, you can reduce the effect but not be rid of it entirely. His solution is to make it work for you, these lines can produce interesting effects on tree trunks for example, they are perfect for abstract backgrounds, producing many effects, maybe even desirable effects. He thinks watercolour paper is not suitable, as the ink sinks in too fast. He's tried YUPO and now uses that...whiteboard can also be used. He says it's very different to watercolour and takes getting used to...so I need to fiddle with it more.
It's clear I've been using the wrong paper, I'll be getting some Yupo and Bristol Board (which apparently is designed for ink).
Posted
I'm still blundering about in my 'try it and see' way. I've ordered some Bristol Board and while waiting for that I thought I'd have another bash in my A3 sketchbook...I preferred my first attempt to the last effort with mixed media paper. This was not meant to produce a 'result' as a painting, it's just to mess about and try things. Here's the sketch where I stopped, having got all I wanted from it.
First I dampened the sky area with clean water...then I laid on the ink with a large brush. I wasn't worried if I got the hard lines along the edges of the brush marks...in fact I thought they might add to the alien feel of the pic. The ink was put on altogether while the paper was wet, I'd decided to let it do what it wanted and hoped for a 'happy' accident. It didn't really work but I got very few of the 'hard lines' I had on the multi-media paper. Weird! Maybe the thinner paper - like YUPO- IS better for inks. The two blobs on the right (if you can pick them out from all the other blobs) was me using the droppers on the ink bottles to drip ink onto the still wet paper-yellow and red - to see what happened. Not a lot!
For the face I mixed light red, yellow and white for the skin. This mix went on beautifully...no hard lines. It did obscure the original ink drawn lines, but that's no big deal. It would have been better if it didn't, I just had to go over them again. You can see I put a little shadow in places, that went on OK. The blue of his clothes also went on without hard lines...this was blue straight from the bottle. I reworked some lines on the face and clothes, and settled for that.
This was a quicky, messing about, type picture, but I like the poster effect. Most of my work looks like that anyway.
While I was writing this, my order of Bristol Board came clattering through the letter box. So, tomorrow, if I have time, I'll have a go with that.
Once again, I didn't get the result I was expecting, but it was fun doing it. That's the only reason I do this anyway.
First I dampened the sky area with clean water...then I laid on the ink with a large brush. I wasn't worried if I got the hard lines along the edges of the brush marks...in fact I thought they might add to the alien feel of the pic. The ink was put on altogether while the paper was wet, I'd decided to let it do what it wanted and hoped for a 'happy' accident. It didn't really work but I got very few of the 'hard lines' I had on the multi-media paper. Weird! Maybe the thinner paper - like YUPO- IS better for inks. The two blobs on the right (if you can pick them out from all the other blobs) was me using the droppers on the ink bottles to drip ink onto the still wet paper-yellow and red - to see what happened. Not a lot!
For the face I mixed light red, yellow and white for the skin. This mix went on beautifully...no hard lines. It did obscure the original ink drawn lines, but that's no big deal. It would have been better if it didn't, I just had to go over them again. You can see I put a little shadow in places, that went on OK. The blue of his clothes also went on without hard lines...this was blue straight from the bottle. I reworked some lines on the face and clothes, and settled for that.
This was a quicky, messing about, type picture, but I like the poster effect. Most of my work looks like that anyway.
While I was writing this, my order of Bristol Board came clattering through the letter box. So, tomorrow, if I have time, I'll have a go with that.
Once again, I didn't get the result I was expecting, but it was fun doing it. That's the only reason I do this anyway.
Posted
This is the way we learn about a new medium and the best support for it to produce the look we want. An interesting thread, Lew.
I use black Chinese ink on rice paper, the ink Is permanent when dry. This ink blends and disperses well when the paper is dampened first its a very thin paper
and needs careful handling, that said, the Yupo could be a good choice for your inks, as you mention this too is a thinner paper.
Your second work does have a smoother look especially on the face and garment.
Posted
Always interesting, Lew, and looking forward to your next results. The big problem here for me is simply money.... I don't have enough of it; I'm not on the bones of my backside, but I paint in oil, acrylic, watercolour, gouache, pen and ink - I'd like to try so much more, but I also like to eat and heat the flat.... The oils in particular consume a lot of money - it would be very nice if resources were unlimited ... still, and there it is, they're not.
Now, Heaven knows!, this is not an appeal for cash! (Give generously - luncheon vouchers and cigars accepted - Stinting is SUCH a mistake!) But I think we'll agree we can't try everything - and it's not surprising that artists tend to settle on one or two tried and tested media. But then, that makes me all the more respectful of those like you, who will try things beyond their usual scope. And to be honest, it's more laziness than poverty that limits me - I've tried pen and ink, brush and ink, Indian ink, Chinese ink, acrylic ink, acrylic paint in all its configurations, gouache, watercolour, oil paint,carbon pencil, conté crayon, hard pastel, soft pastel, oil pastel, charcoal pencil, willow charcoal, graphite, wax pencil, wax-based paint, silverpoint, and that's just off the top of my head. I've come down to three basic media, plus sketches with whatever comes to hand; and it took me a long time to get there.
And so what - well: I'd say try the lot; however advanced in years you might be, if you can possibly afford it, try every medium open to you. You can't really go on using all of them, unless you're extremely wealthy or have acquired large stocks of materials over the years, but the more you try, the more likely you are to find the right medium for whatever you want to express. We don't need to produce artworks in every medium, size or dimension available - we need to suit our own style, dimension, and vision.
Posted
Back again. I had a quick try with my new Bristol Board. Frisk A4, 20 sheets, 250gsm, smooth...£5.99, if you're interested. I was expecting actual 'board', but it's more like card. It can be bought in various thicknesses. I could have painted a few swatches with the ink, and then tried to blend them, but I preferred to test it using it as I would in a painting...so that means a face. I did a very quick, not very good figure with a waterproof pen. As it's not a proper drawing, I tried two things with the skin colour. For the face I mixed yellow, light red, and white ink, diluted with some water and painted that over the whole face...pen lines include. Reasonably even and flat, no 'hard lines' on the face, pen lines still showing solidly. Good. I mixed a darker skin tone, and put that on the face...again no hard ink lines around the brush strokes, and I was able to blend the edges of this tone with a damp clean brush. I tried using white ink to add a few highlights...you can see them on the nose and cheeks.....(blast, I haven't posted the pic yet. Here it is...)
...the white does register, but I found I couldn't blend the edges.
When I painted the body flesh, I left white paper for the highlights. How I paint with watercolour is to paint a mid skin tone, leaving white paper for highlights, then I blend the edges with the white. When dry I paint the darker tones, and blend the edges of the darker tones...and so on, and so on. (Probably not the best way, but it suits me.) I tried that on the body, I put the mid tone everywhere that I wanted, then blended the edges with the white...that bit worked. Then I put the darker tones on everywhere, and went back to blend the edges...not so good...here a there a few hard lines, although not quite so prominent on this paper.
On the right of the pic, I wet the paper and then randomly dripped yellow, red and blue ink onto the wet patch. It did it's thing. I quite like it, I must apply to join the abstract artist's club. Notice there are no hard dark edges around the dripped area...I got that on the mixed media paper I tried.
Conclusions...the Bristol board is much better than my sketchbook, and my mixed media paper. But I don't think I'll be using this ink to paint whole pictures. It'll just get added to my mixed media weapons, and if I'm going to use it I'll need Bristol Board.
I like the Bristol Board, beautiful to draw on...I'll try that with watercolour too.
So no more 'all ink' paintings for me.
Robert I agree with your comments. You can't try everything, new 'wonder-products' come out every week. I would not have bought this ink, it was a Christmas gift. There's nothing wrong with it, I'm sure, in other hands, marvelous results are possible. I have bought a few 'new' things recently. Water soluable pencils...H to 6B...use them dry of wet...love 'em. Faber water-soluable coloured pencils, Inktense coloured pencils...wonderful. I need to pay more attention to the paper...my Daler Rowney Multi-Media paper is just great for many things, but not everything. I shall be using different surfaces in future.
...the white does register, but I found I couldn't blend the edges.
When I painted the body flesh, I left white paper for the highlights. How I paint with watercolour is to paint a mid skin tone, leaving white paper for highlights, then I blend the edges with the white. When dry I paint the darker tones, and blend the edges of the darker tones...and so on, and so on. (Probably not the best way, but it suits me.) I tried that on the body, I put the mid tone everywhere that I wanted, then blended the edges with the white...that bit worked. Then I put the darker tones on everywhere, and went back to blend the edges...not so good...here a there a few hard lines, although not quite so prominent on this paper.
On the right of the pic, I wet the paper and then randomly dripped yellow, red and blue ink onto the wet patch. It did it's thing. I quite like it, I must apply to join the abstract artist's club. Notice there are no hard dark edges around the dripped area...I got that on the mixed media paper I tried.
Conclusions...the Bristol board is much better than my sketchbook, and my mixed media paper. But I don't think I'll be using this ink to paint whole pictures. It'll just get added to my mixed media weapons, and if I'm going to use it I'll need Bristol Board.
I like the Bristol Board, beautiful to draw on...I'll try that with watercolour too.
So no more 'all ink' paintings for me.
Robert I agree with your comments. You can't try everything, new 'wonder-products' come out every week. I would not have bought this ink, it was a Christmas gift. There's nothing wrong with it, I'm sure, in other hands, marvelous results are possible. I have bought a few 'new' things recently. Water soluable pencils...H to 6B...use them dry of wet...love 'em. Faber water-soluable coloured pencils, Inktense coloured pencils...wonderful. I need to pay more attention to the paper...my Daler Rowney Multi-Media paper is just great for many things, but not everything. I shall be using different surfaces in future.
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