Vanilla Undercover: Underpainting with Copic Markers for Beautiful Realism - Leafy Green

 
Underpaint with Copic Markers! Try coloring with B34 underneath your YG blending combination, adding realistic dimension to summery green leaves.| VanillaArts.com | #copicmarker #realisticcoloring #underpainting
 
 

Realistic Color

Traditional Copic Marker blending combinations can add a little bit of depth and dimension but they can not add realism.

It’s not a case of finding better marker recipes. You can not color with realism until you use the shadowy, grayed, and desaturated colors found in nature.

Always remember: real shade is not darker color, shade is desaturated color.

To create the desaturated colors that Copic does not make, Vanilla Arts Company teaches Online Workshops and Livestream Coloring challenges using the underpainting method. Students learn to layer colors realistically rather than blend.

Underpainting creates natural colors found in everyday life.

 

Copic - Leafy Green

Try layering B34 underneath YG17 with YG03 to lighten and brighten the end of the color run. You’ll love the slightly murky Sap Green color it creates. It’s perfect for the underside of raspberry leaves on a sunny summer day.

Elena’s Advice:

Make sure not to overstroke the B34 or it will disappear. And don’t go crazy; we’re adding gentle shadiness, not darkening the whole leaf.

“Leafy Green” blending combination for Copic Markers. Underpaint YG yellow-green markers with B blue for realistic depth and dimension. Green swatch. | VanillaArts.com | Alcohol marker color theory.

Looking for More Blending Combinations?


 

Elena Cazares is a Vanilla Arts student and a budding online instructor with beautiful sense of color and style. She is a hurricane of positive creative energy.

Elena runs CraftsForPaws.com, a 501(c)(3) non profit animal rescue. C4P’s donates 100% of their profits to rescue and care for worst-case stray dogs and cats in Dallas and Fort Worth, Texas.

Shop to benefit Crafts for Paws at their sister site - Violeta Ink. Join Elena’s Copic Coloring Club here for online class announcements and catch her YouTube cardmaking series here.

Elena Bio Pic.jpg
 

Elena Cazares

Elena Cazares is a Vanilla Arts student and online instructor with a beautiful sense of color and style. She is a hurricane of positive, creative energy.

Elena runs CraftsForPaws.com, an online shop for Copic Markers and Copic supplies. C4P donates 100% of profits to rescue and care for worst-case stray dogs and cats in Dallas and Fort Worth, Texas.

Shop at Crafts for Paws here. Join Elena’s C4P Copic Coloring Club here.