J. Herbin India Ink - Encre de Chine video tests and follow up on the dry wash of Lyra graphite crayon shavings

Thanks to Karen from Exaclair for this sample of J. Herbin Encre de Chine India ink. 2 minute video testing the J. Herbin India ink with a Pentel Neo-Sable 6 round brush (FYI: I have never tried the service of the Stationery Art website, but they have several pictures and basic info on this synthetic brush that I picked up at a Kinokuniya stationery store a few years ago) on white card stock.Test doodle on Georgia Pacific white card stock. Given its shellac type lacquer formulation some sections dry with quite a bit of shine depending on the viewing angle.Drew this quick coloring outline on the Maruman Art Spiral watercolor book.Colored with Winsor & Newton Artist's watercolours.
2 minute video testing the J. Herbin India ink with a Tachikawa dip pen on white card stock.
The lines drawn with the nib pen dried within seconds and remained undisturbed by the watercolor washes. Thus the J. Herbin Encre de Chine would be a good choice for black ink drawings that you plan to immediately color with water based media.These porcelain plates (starting on the top left corner and going clockwise) contained dried washes of Lyra graphite crayon shavings, Daniel Smith Quinacridone Gold watercolor stick, and Faber Castell Albrecht Durer Lemon yellow aquarelle stick shavings (this last one was the harder to redissolve - notice the clump of yellow waxy residue 0n the bottom plate). The first two were easily reactivated with the atomizer bottle and a wet brush.
For the last test of the evening made this 1-minute video checking if the dry graphite wash from the previous night could still be revived with some water and used for some sketching.
The reactivated Lyra graphite crayon wash was still usable after drying up on the porcelain dish for a day.

Still Doodling with some Brushes

Felt like doodling with ink tonight, so I grabbed an inexpensive Blick Economy short round #2 brush and used it to doodle on the Maruman Art Spiral watercolor book with the J. Herbin 1670 Anniversary ink.
Dried watercolor stick washes.
Adding an outline with the J. Herbin 1670 Anniversary ink and a Blick Economy short round #6 brush. Here is a short video of some brush doodling on the Exacompta sketchbook.
Demo video. Combined the shavings from the water soluble 2B Lyra Graphite crayon and some water to make some ink for drawing.
This picture shows how stained the Aquaflo waterbrush nib ended up after blending the watersoluble graphite tests from yesterday. This test video shows that the dried wash from the blended pencil strokes was fairly resistant to erasing, but the dry graphite ink wash was slightly easier to lighten with an electric eraser.
Demo video. Quick doodle drawn with a Winsor & Newton Gold Sceptre II 4 round sable/synthetic blend brush.Monster bird sketch.2-minute demo video. Fat dragon doodle using the Aquaflo waterbrush. Thinking of video taping future impromptu doodle sessions trying out assorted materials from my collection in an attempt to increase posting frequency.

Lyra Graphite Crayons and Sharpener Review

Got a couple of new sketching tools yesterday in the mail: Lyra watersoluble graphite crayons in 2B and 9B grades and a matching oversize Lyra graphite sharpener to keep them pointed. While the sticks are wrapped with paper, they can still be a tad messy and stain hands and surrounding areas. I was happy to discover that they fit in my Intus 123 pastel holder, so my fingers remained clean while doodling with them.
The oversize Lyra Graphite Sharpener Art.-Nr. 9496 also fit the Pitt Graphite crayons and this Faber Castell lemon yellow aquarelle stick, so it could sharpen it easily and produce shavings for making washes.
This sharpener was made in Germany by KUM. Compare its massive size to the conventional wedge sharpeners shown below.
I could not see much difference between the 2B and 9B grades in the first sample swatches, but their differences in softness and darkness became more apparent when making the letter size test sketches on white card stock. The 9B was noticeably darker and glided very smoothly on the paper.
Test sketch with the 2B graphite stick before and after blending with a waterbrush.
Test sketch with the 9B graphite stick before and after blending with a waterbrush.
Bit of coloring added with a few Daniel Smith watercolor sticks. Pigment was picked up from the sticks with a moistened waterbrush and applied directly to the paper, so the colors came out too strong. It would probably be more efficient to work with a palette or porcelain dish and gradually build the intensity of the washes, but I had neither handy at the library where I was making this tests.It was fun to play with these Lyra watersoluble graphite crayons. They readily dissolved upon contact with water and would make good choices for working on large drawings at a good speed.

Daniel Smith Extra Fine Quinacridone Gold Watercolor Stick Review Test

I had been wanting to try this Daniel Smith Extra Fine Quinacridone Gold Watercolor Stick for a while, and their recent free shipping offer was all the incentive I needed to include it in my last supply order. I often use Raw Sienna for coloring skin tones in pen & ink sketches, and according to their product description the Quinacridone Gold (PO49) replaces it.
Used some of my waterproof sketching tools to create some coloring outlines for this review.
Short demo video 1 and video 2.
The top row of faces was colored with pure washes of Quinacridone Gold while the bottom row was colored with a little Quinacridone Coral in the mixture to produce a Peach skin tone on the first two faces. The left side of the last tanned face was colored with a wash of Quinacridone Burnt Orange that turned out to be too strong, so it was rewetted and some color lifted with the clean dry brush.
The Daniel Smith Extra Fine Quinacridone Gold Watercolor Stick worked well for rendering skin tones and made a fine addition to my sketching tool kit. Going to have to keep exploring other color combinations with it to see what other color applications are possible with this new pigment in my palette.

Recent visit to The von Liebig Art Center

Took my folks earlier today to view the Biennial Faculty Exhibit at The von Liebig Art Center.
Student exhibit from my second ARTSCool Manga Cartooning Class.Marker illustration by 8 year old student.

Combining Cretacolor 5.6 mm oil-based drawing leads with Daniel Smith Watercolor Sticks

Outlines were drawn with oil-based Cretacolor 5.6 mm drawing leads: Nero 261 01, Nero "Medium" 261 02, and Sanguine Crayon 262 02. Then colored with washes of Daniel Smith Extra Fine watercolor sticks applied with a Escoda 1212 round brush #6.
I like the combination of these materials for producing quick colored sketches. The outlines drawn with the oil-based leads resist smudging and remain clearly visible through the translucent washes used for coloring them.

Doodling with a Daniel Smith Extra Fine Watercolor Stick demo video

Doodling with a synthetic The Art Store #8 round brush and Faber Castell Albrecht Durer aquarelle sticks on Canson watercolor paper. Regular readers would probably already know that the aquarelle sticks are a favorite staple tool in my sketching kit. Yet since they have been discontinued for a while, it would be only wise to explore other options currently available. The Daniel Smith Extra Fine Watercolor sticks have been around for a couple of years and have a range of 44 colors. Despite their similar names, they actually perform quite differently. I value the watercolor sticks more as a convenient source of watercolor washes like an oversize watercolor pan, and find that the aquarelle sticks can be more effective drawing tools given their softer waxy texture.
Doodling some faces with a Winsor & Newton Series 7 #4 round brush and Daniel Smith watercolor sticks and Faber Castell Albrecht Durer aquarelle sticks. When used side-by-side, it becomes quite apparent that the watercolor sticks dissolve much more readily and completely than the wax-based aquarelle sticks. Notice the even skin tones that were achieved with a mop quill and a light wash of Quinacridone Burnt Orange on the faces on the left. In contrast the hat and hood drawn on the faces on the right with brush strokes from a moistened black aquarelle stick have a blotched appearance.
2-minute video exploring the mark making and color range of a single watercolor stick of Quinacridone Burnt Orange.
I really like the convenience and ease of use of the watercolor stick format. Making color washes of different strength in a porcelain plate simply required a watercolor atomizer bottle and swirling the stick on the wet surface until reaching the desired intensity. The watercolor sticks seem to yield cleaner even washes than the aquarelle sticks that often have a mottled appearance due to the soluble wax in their composition. Recommended addition to a portable watercolor sketching kit.

Two New Robots added to the Collection

Thanks again Sunny for the neat souvenir gifts from NY MoMA: A DCI Jumbo Robot eraser and neat Piperoid Kibatora robot building kit. They both make great original additions to my collection of decorations at my drawing desk.
Six colorful paper straws with some cutting, folding, and squashing will become a neat centaur-like Japanese robot.
Only tool needed to build this paper kit was a pair of scissors.
Kibatora fully assembled and ready for action. While it makes for a nice desk decoration, it can even do double duty as a memo holder.

Exhibition Pieces up until August 28th

For my local readers, my Mochica-inspired ink drawing will remain available for viewing at The von Liebig Art Center Faculty Biennial 2010 exhibition until August 28th.

Test Doodles and Sharpening tests with the Pentel Black Polymer 999 4B pencil

After spotting them in the Jet Pens clearance section, I just couldn't pass up the opportunity of trying the 4B grade of a now discontinued pencil line that I personally considered part of the Triad of Supreme Japanese Wooden Pencils (consisting of the Mitsubishi Hi-Uni, Tombow Mono 100, and the Pentel Black Polymer 999 premium wooden pencil lines) for their generally ultra-smooth smudge-resistant graphite cores that put conventional pencils to shame that suggested the presence of some wax component in their formulation.
While this Alvin brass bullet sharpener is one of the newest tools in my kit, it kept breaking the wood casing around the pencil point after repeated sharpening attempts.
After a few more sharpening tests, this KUM wedge sharpener proved to be the best fit for this particular pencil model yielding smooth tapered points with no breaks on the wood surface.
Test sketch drawn on a Maruman Croquis pocket sketchbook.
Couple of test doodles on Strathmore 300 smooth bristol paper.
The Pentel Black Polymer 999 4B pencil featured a strong lead that yielded rich dark strokes. Smooth sharpening required trying out a number of German sharpener models (Alvin, Faber-Castell, and KUM) in my collection to find the right fit. While all the sharpeners had fairly new sharpening blades, several models tended to snap the wood casing near the tip. A problem I also experience when trying out the HB pencil grade of the Black Polymer 999 line. While this line has reportedly been discontinued, there are luckily still several premium Japanese wooden pencils with comparable or superior performance still featured at Jet Pens.