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CHECKING IN

I love it when I can report in after a very productive week.

I made a big move to begin condensing and simplifying classes, courses, and forums. Big news coming about this soon.

Then it’s Livestream-a-palooza on Friday and Saturday. Wonk and UP streams are a great end to the week. I’m still an introvert at heart but I really do love chatting with people about projects and processes.

Oh, and a video too!

The Hangover

We’ve been talking about white and cream these past few weeks… but really, all this talk about white isn’t really about white.

At heart, it’s all about highlights. That’s truly why we worry about white.

First we covered white versus off-white paper. People worry that cream makes whites look yellowy… when it honestly, good coloring can avoid this.

Then I explained the hidden value of cream paper for florals. The boosted warmth adds sunshine to flowers.

Last week, we discussed white highlights with white colored pencil.

Now let’s finally get to it— the white topic you’ve been waiting for…

Are you ready?

Let’s talk about white pens.

If you haven’t picked up on it already, I’m not a fan.

I know every colorer has 14 white pens in their top drawer but I don’t like ‘em.

Why?

Because I’ve never seen a real highlight that looked like a comma.

Or a semi colon.

Or four squares. That’s the Window’s symbol, not a highlight.

Gel pens encourage dumb stuff.

Oh, I’ll just add three small highlights to make it pop…

Fourteen hours later, you wake up under a bridge with a raging headache and a face tattoo.

So tell me, do these highlights add sparkle?

Personality?

Realism?

Nope. Nope. And more nope.

Gel pen highlights are fun for you. That’s it. It’s like a little party on your paper. Who cares if they look weird, they’re fun, fun fun!

Meanwhile the family is wondering why your forehead reads “Opaque AF!”

Check out the apple on the left. See any white highlights there?

And by white, I mean honest-to-goodness real white.

Most people talk themselves into seeing highlights as white but look at the apple highlights up there, then compare them to the background white of this newsletter. Are the highlights actually white?

No?

Then please, please, please— don’t use a gel pen.

It’s a simple rule for life. If you don’t see white, then don’t pick up a white pen.

I don’t care how cute white highlights are.

I don’t care if all your friends are doing it.

White-ish is not white.

So don’t do it.

If you must, try this guy.

Posca Paint Pen, Extra Fine. Just get the white, you don’t need all 66 colors.

What’s so special about Posca White pens?

Ahhhh, grasshopper, that’s a special secret.

One of the biggest problems with Copic (and this is also true for watercolor) is that we must reserve our whites.

Oil, acrylic, gouache, and pastel artists have it easier. They can spend days building up dark heavy color and then la, la, la… add a few white highlights on top at the last minute with barely a thought.

Their whites are dense enough that they can lay white over dark. And their layers bond with each other so their white over 42 layers of dark actually sticks.

We don’t have such luxury.

We don’t have native white and the white products we add are slippery and wimpy.

If you want whites or lights, you must plan them from the beginning and reserve space for the white paper to show.

In our next episode of Sounds from the Studio, listen as Amy cries in anguish “Bleepin’ bleep bleep! I just painted over my white space again!”

Watercolor artists have a handy product called liquid frisket (something the youngins’ call masking fluid) which protects the white paper while you paint over it.

Pencil and marker peeps don’t have anything like this.

(And no, in case you were wondering… Copic eats masking fluid. Colored pencil plows right through it.)

Posca is my solution.

Posca is water-based paint, not gel-ink.

It’s actually gouache in a pen.

Because it’s paint, it takes longer to dry. We call the wet stage “open time” and Posca stays open longer than gel pens. Plus, Posca is waterbased, so you can open it again with a damp paintbrush.

Open time is magic time; you can smudge Posca to soften the lines.

See the billowy clouds? Posca.

See the porch details? Posca.

Even better, once it dries, Posca is tintable.

See the grassy green grass? Tinted Posca.

See the dry brown seagrass? Tinted Posca.

I went right over the dried white Posca with a Copic marker to get green and tan grasses. You can’t do that with a white gel pen.

And really, if you need some hair of the dog— if you absolutely must slap white commas on a red daisy, Posca can do that too.

Posca is more versatile because it gives you the option for commas or realism.

Avoid the hangover.

If you gotta do a pen, make it a Posca.