Inspire Me - Marker PLUS Pencils with Kathy Racoosin

Hello Friends, Welcome to another Inspire Me Monday. My name is Kathy Racoosin and my blog is The Daily Marker. If you don't know me I pretty much live to color. 

If you are a colored pencil person or a marker person .... today's post is for you. I want to share with you a few tips for using markers first and adding pencils after for some easy "no line coloring".

Today I am inking up this beautiful floral frame called, "Floribunda". The petals and leaves are nice and open for successful coloring. I always say, "Stamp choice is as important as song choice" If you watch any of those singing shows you know what I mean lol. 

If you choose a stamp to color that has tight areas and is really small (leaves, petals or whatever) I find it  harder to color and to get a nice gradient blend of color. For example, the large two flowers on this stamp are very easy to color because of the nice and open spaces on each petal. When I am choosing a stamp I want about 75% of the stamp to have nice and open areas to color or it's to frustrating and not easy on the eyes. The "daisies" on this stamp are smaller but, not difficult because the petals are nice and round. I was able to maintain a decorative white edge on each petal. 

That's why I say stamp choice is so important because it more pleasurable to color. Coloring is supposed to be relaxing. 

My favorite ink for "no line coloring" is Warm Glow because it's dark enough so I can see what I am coloring ... very important right! 

(This ink can be used for watercoloring or alcohol markers)

After stamping this beautiful floral frame color around the image with a marker and then fill in the rest of the background leaving some space in the center. Choose any light marker to soften the line of color in the center. (I used a blue and a very light green)

In the top part of the above photo is a portion of the background that is colored only with markers. 

Outlining the image with brown really defines my coloring and helps the image pop as you can see in the bottom half of the photo. It's amazing what adding the subtle color can do for the image. (I use a fine tip brown or sepia multiliner) 

Now the image is prepped and ready for a final layer of color with pencils!

The photo above left ... is my completed frame. On the right is before I added pencil detail. I also added some black marker in the "nooks and crannies" for more definition in my coloring. 

If you use only pencils I suggest adding a light layer of color first with a marker. Adding a first layer of color with a marker saves you so much time in the end. The Copic color E50 is one of those must have colors. You can see the warm glow come through on the flower petals and some of the leaves. 

A sharp pencil is a must if you want to color with a series of lines only. I resharpen my pencil many times for each petal or leaf. In this photo you can see how I used green and brown lines from the top of the petals down toward the center of the flower. IF your pencil is SHARP this technique works really well. If you pencil is NOT sharp it doesn't look so good. 

Keep mind the way you grip your pencil. Are you clutching it? Try to relax your hand and think about where you fingers are holding the pencil. If you hold your fingers further down the pencil ... like in the middle of the pencil ... that position forces you to have a lighter grip. 

My focus is to have a darker and lighter area on each petal but, I don't worry where the light is coming from. It's to stressful to worry about the light source. Just go for it :)

That's it for today's post and thank you for your visit today. I hoped you picked up a few tips for using your colored pencils or combining markers and pencils. Have a great week! Hugs, Kathy

Inspire Me Monday: Coloring using only 10 Copic Markers

Coloring using only 10 Copic Markers

Hi everyone. It's Mindy here from My Creative Scoop! Today I'm sharing a fun tutorial which is absolutely perfect if you don't have many Copic Markers in your collection. I'll be listing my Copic Markers used throughout the tutorial but please keep in mind you can use whatever 2 coordinating colors you have. In this tutorial, I'm using the Power Poppy stamp set Bough Wow Wow. 

Alright, let's get start coloring! I've stamped my image using Memento Desert Sand Ink onto my Copic Xpress it cardstock to get that no line technique. So take your lightest green and color in all the little leaves on the vine.

Then, take your darker green and make a tiny line, or flick going up the center of the leaves. There's not enough room for any detailed shading. 

Then take your N3 and trace along one side of the fuzzy snow puffs.

Using the N0, go along the side of the N3, blending it out.

Then, using N0 create small dots in the fuzzy snow puffs, we want to give them some texture so they look fuzzy.

Then again with the N3, make some more dots for texture in the fuzzy snow puffs. Stay closer to the shaded side of the snow puff so that side appears shadowed -- but still add small dots all over. Then take the N3 and shadow the starting point of the ribbon intertwining throughout the image. Afterward, take your N0 and blend out the N3. Still, leave a white area.

Then with your lightest brown shade the mittens. You want to make a harsh shadow at first then flick towards the center of the mitt. Notice the shadowed areas and don't just outline the mitten.

Then add some details with your darker brown, and define the shadows and the design in the mitten. 

Trace over with the lighter brown again, blending out that harsh line between the 2 colors. Notice there is still some white into the center part of the mittens.

Then take both colors and by adding some dots to the mittens you'll give that yarn - texture look. With the darker color, make more dots at the shadowed areas and fewer in the lighter area.

Then take a light pink (or any other color) and trace the heart but notice on the left side I went a little thicker. We want to create that round 3D look to this heart.

Then on the shadowed side, trace using the darker pink.

Then, flicking the darker pink out towards the center, pull through filling in the heart.

Depending on how dark you want your heart to be, you may want to repeat the 2 previous steps. Once you are happy with your heart's definition, take the darker color and trace the stitches all around the heart.

I wanted my ribbon to pop out a little more, so I added some more N3. Depending on how heavy you go, you may need to re-soften using your N0 again.

Once finished, I wanted to add a little something around the image. So, I added some dots using G0000, filling in the white areas inside and gradually coming out around the image.

I hope you have enjoyed this tutorial and it inspires you to create a color, even if you don't have many Copic Markers to work with.

For more tutorials, classes, and inspiration please visit my blog, My Creative Scoop!

♥ Mindy

Inspire Me Monday - No Lines Copic Colouring

Hey everyone! Jessie here today sharing a little no lines colouring using Sunflower Power Digital Stamp.

This image is one of my all time favorites from Power Poppy, I think I have done it in every colour ever, pink, orange, purple... and now teal! I did film the colouring of this card, unfortunately something is wrong with my microphone and it wouldn't allow me to record a voice over, so it just has music over top of the video.

The wonderful Marcella, creator of all the marvelous images here at Power Poppy told me that I should also mention my facebook group. It is called Cards and Colour! and has been around just a few months we are small group but have tons of fun! I do 1-3 live colourings in the group every month and it is filled with tons of wonderful people sharing their creativity and knowledge! I would love for you to come join us!

           

Hope you still enjoy the video, and I promise my mic will be replaced next time and there will be a voice over not just music! 

Thanks for stopping by,
Hugz,
Jessie

No Line Coloring using Colored Pencils with Kathy

Hello Friends, how was your weekend? Welcome to another Inspire Me Monday with me, Kathy from The Daily Marker.

Did you catch  February's Power & Spark challenge? It's all about saying 'YES to NO lines' and the card that Cindy Lawrence created  ... well, let's just say I was blown away. I tucked that inspiration in my back pocket and took it out for today. 

Using Power Poppy stamps you can achieve the no line look with ease. Promise! Why you might ask? Because the illustrations have the detailed lines to make it easy for you to see the highlights. Watch my video to see what I mean. 

For my card today I used an image from the "In Praise of Sunflowers" stamp set & the "Prairie Cheer" stamp set. 

If you don't have a beige ink, you can use any light color. I have used pink distress ink or a light blue dye ink before or even a gray ink. One thing to keep in mind is that you must follow through and finish. As you add light layers of color on your flower, it will be a work in progress and you might not be happy with it. Stick with it and you will in the end. 

When you are masking an image, you don't need to spend time masking the entire image.

I inked up only the tops of the small daisies with the beige ink and drew the rest of the stem with a colored pencil. This is a good photo to see all the detail in this stamp. Go over the highlighted areas with a dark pencil to get started. 

A valuable lesson I learned during this coloring session was to color the sunflower bud at the same time as the sunflower. As always, my hope is that you will pick up a tip or two. Thanks for your visit today and have a good week. 

Hugs, 

Kathy