I’m on the home stretch with the latest doggie illo. Got the inking done tonight, now I await client comments before adding color (praying, of course, that there will be no more changes or redraws). I figured out a nifty trick while doing these inkings and paintings… if I run a piece of 80 lb. Arches hot press watercolor paper through my printer and print the black lineart onto it, I can add watercolor without the black running (my Epson 2200 uses permanent dyes–who knew?). Which solves the problem of having to do the ink perfectly the first time (as I can scan it and fix my bloopers before printing, and there are quite a few), and makes the whole process move along a little more smoothly. I’m using waterproof ink anyway, but I like having a “safe” surface to work on. If I mess up the color the first time, I can print another lineart copy and start the color all over again. Rock on.
On one hand I feel a bit like a fraud for doing the whole scanning/perfecting thing, but then I remember an art exhibit I saw when I was in college. It was a children’s book illustrator exhibit, and it was rad. But the most rad part was seeing Dr. Seuss’s original inkings… and all the Graphic White paint covering his mistakes… and probably a lot of client-requested changes. There was copious evidence that it is plenty ok to make mistakes and cover them up. Thank the Adobe gods for Photoshop.
Got tricks?
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