Mixed media, markers and pencils, take 1 (Page 2/3)

I used medium weight Bristol paper (70lb) for this piece. For me, when it comes to using markers I prefer to use a light paper, such as 50lb, so I can get a smooth blending effect, like watercolors. I don't like marker paper as much because it is harder to blend the colors as it dries fast. You don't want to use a heavy paper for markers either, as it will suck your markers dry in no time.

The pencils here are actually much, much lighter than this, but I wanted them to be seen on the computer.

So now the inks are done. I used Zig pens to ink this, but any waterproof ink will do.

Not all the pencil lines translated to pen ones. The biggest example, is of course up at his right eye, where the green light effects will be. I'll get a much more bright effect if I only use markers and/or pencils, and leave out the black lines.

There are some lines I only did partially as well, so I can play more with markers.

Here I've done the background in markers. The picture is larger than my scanner, so some of it is cut off. Not a problem tho'. I decided to do the background first, so I can get a good feel of how Dinobot's colors will look on it. It also makes his figure stand out more. I made a few mistakes as well, and the markers bled a bit more than I estimated, but it should be nothing I won't be able to fix up as I go.

I've layed in all the basic colors here.

I'm not sure how light I want the highlights of his blue areas to be, so I used one of the lightest markers I have to start off with. I've started wit the basic highlights on all the metal areas elsewhere, and got a little carried away already on the black areas on his head. They're pretty much done.

I did the light stripes on his dino skin before I did the dark areas, because it was easier to lay them out, then cover over what I didn't like.

I did the dark areas of his dino skin last because I wanted to work wet-on-wet to get some nice soft blending effects. For the metal areas I'm going to want harder lines, so it's good to let them dry.

Here I've done the toning on Dinobot's skin. I worked in several layers, keeping the paper somewhat wet with the various browns, and worked in deeper and deeper shades. Then I let it dry a little, working on the shading of his lighter stripes. I went back again to the dark brown and added stipling to get texture, then to the light stripes for the same effect.

I added a bit more shading on his light stripes, then started on the metal shades.

I let them dry before I add another layer of color on the orange-gold metal.