Dry Mediums Versus Wet Mediums

Hi! This week I'm going to talk about some of the major differences between wet and draw traditional art mediums. I won't go in to express details but just some general things to keep in mind.

Okay, lets begin!

Control-ability:

This is in general easier with dry media; Colored pencils and charcoal pencils can be sharpened to a point and do fine details, whereas things like watercolors and gouache is a lot harder to control because you need brushes and water. Markers are much easier if you want wet media, and the harder medium for dry would

be soft and oil pastels as they are neither brushed on nor always in pencil form but are closer to being small blocks most of the time, but you can but soft pencils in some places as pencils.

 

 

Blending:

Blended with baby-oil and blender pencil

Blending things like colored pencils is based off of layering and burnishing , there are many techniques including using a blender pencil, a white colored pencil, or baby-oil to blend colored pencils. For graphics pencils and soft pastels there are blending stubs that are made to blend the more powedery medium together, you can also use cotton swabs you buy from the bath section of he store or your finger, but I've had some unhappy accidents with using my fingers for blending like forgetting which finger had which color then I mixed and made an ugly color...ugggghhhh don't do that!

Watercolor blended with more watercolor and water

For watercolors you need water to blend, and water-based markers...well...you pretty much don't have a good blending capability with them unless you want to use them also as watercolors (how to do that will be

talked about another time). For alcohol-based markers they're blended using a colorless blender and eachother, different brands have colorless blenders and I have never used one but I have watched many other artists use them and they are quite useful.

Color Depth:

This is something that can be a bit irritating but c'est la vie. With wet media the color you put down is never the color that dries, it always dries lighter. Depending on the medium and quality, the color, texture, and depth will change from not so bad to drastic. For example, you can put down a wash of watercolor from a decent brand, the color you put on is vibrant and saturated, once it dries the white of the paper comes out a bit and lightens the color. Markers are the same, and a side tip never believe the color on the barrel of the marker, test it first, the colors they put on the barrel are never accurate; But anyway back on point... Here's another example: If you put down a medium purple but it looks very dark wait a few minutes for it to dry it will lighten up a bit. 

Colored with Colored pencil - Background with watercolor

Dry mediums on the other hand, the color you put down is the color you get, there is no drying time so whatever you see on the paper is what you will always see (as long as you consider aging which cause things to fade over time). Another thing to remember is the color of your paper will account for

the color of the medium you put down. If you have a black toned paper, don't expect to see any marker unless you have some kind of neon paint marker. If you use something like colored pencils on the other hand, you're much more likely to see the pencil. Lighter colors are obviously recommended.

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Okay, after reading these 3 contrasting differences which one do I think is better?

None! Each are different, and special, taking days, months and/or years of practice. And to be honest, I generally do not use only one medium in a drawing. Even in a colored pencil dominated drawing I will use watercolor for the background and/or pastels. For a marker piece I'll use colored pencils to shade. For watercolors I'll use water-based markers and colored pencils to shade. Just because these things are different doesn't mean they can't work together. I find it a bit amazing actually that each one of these mediums when used alone or together can all make photo-realistic artwork or super cartoony artwork. Some do it better than others, but the results are astonishing.

So where to start? Well, that's also for another time, but if I was to say anything, I'd say a graphite normal pencil, an eraser that works, and a sketch book. That's really all you need.

Now go out there and draw something! The world is looking for new things to discover!

Thank you for reading.

~ God Bless ~

~ Firefly

My First Collage!

Hai. This week will be a little less depressing than the past two, this week I'm gonna show you my first collage!! For those who don't know what a collage is, it's basically paper crafting cutting out shapes to make a piece of artwork gluing or taping together. Some people go all out and use fabric and other 3D things like beads, buttons, other trinkets, sometimes pressed or live flowers, really anything to make a 3D piece of art. I personally used my drawing and painting tools and craft patterned paper I was given by somebody.

I'll tell you a little about what I used since I think it might be interesting.


First, I used printer quality cardstock, it's pretty thick, perfect for marker because it's super smooth but not spongy, it's not good for watercolor though. I used this to cut out the butterflies and the leaves on the middle flower. To cut out the butterflies I cut a smaller piece off of the cardstock and folded it in half drew the wings on one side and cut it out, when unfolded it was even in size and shape. Then I sketched the basic pattern on it and colored with sharpies and Bic markers along with a white gel-pen. I based the orange butterfly off of a Monarch though it's not really a Monarch, and the yellow butterfly is based off of a Swallow-tail butterfly but it doesn't actually look like one at all. I basically based the colors and type of patterns more than anything else. I did make a blue butterfly but it was too big so I gave it to my mother to play with.


For the flowers, I made the purple check-patterned one first, for that one I cut out each petal resulting in a variety of sizes because I did one at a time. For the other two I cut a horizontal strip of the paper I wanted, then cut a piece vertically off of it and used that as a template to cut and have all paper being the basic same size then. After that I piled and used a paperclip to keep secured, drew the petal shape and cut it. - Gluing I glued the petals on to the center part (all centers were made with cardstock) and I glued a scrap piece of cardstock to keep the flowers secured together.


I didn't plan the layout for anything at the start I used laid it out on the paper as I went along. I added all shading and details myself using colored pencils and markers. The background is watercolor, the grassy area is craft paper too.

All Supplies Used:

• 6 Craft Papers (Patterned paper)
• Cardstock (White)
• Mixed media paper – Base paper (what everything is glued on)
• 14 Colored Pencils (5 Prismacolors, 5 Crayola, 2 EK Memory Pencils, 2 Other/Cheap)
• 20 Markers (11 Sharpies, 4 Bic, 4 IDenti Pens, 1 Prismacolor Black)
• Watercolor (Off brand, Raphael)
• 2 Brushes (one flat and one round)

• Scissors
• Eraser
• Stick Glue
• White Pen
• Prismacolor 03 Pen
• Sakura 0.3 mm Pen
• Mechanical pencil
• Three 3D Paint Pens.

Thank you for reading! I hope this was interesting. If you enjoy all things art, please +1, share on whatever social media you like to use, and follow me here. Thanks!


~ God Bless ~


~ Firefly

Some Drawings I've Done Over The Past Few Months

Okay I know the middle or early week would have been better but I'm a lazy jerk and never got the nerve to actually write a decent article so we get these pieces of artwork instead. I'm sorryyyy!!!

Okay here we go, some of these are going to be mentioned in future posts. I'll say a little about some of the artworks. And yeah...it'll explain itself.


Monochrome inked with brown pen and colored with watercolor.

Sunflower with bees, colored with sharpies and colored pencils, on mixed media paper the background is watercolor and the outlines are with inking pens and a sharpie fine tipped marker.

These first two are done on printer cardstock using Prismacolor multi-liners and Sharpies to color. (The light blue from the dress is a Prismacolor marker [I only have 3 of those]).

This next one is I believe the first drawing I've ever colored not in monotone while having the outlines in brown. Colored using watercolor, crayola markers and soft pastels on mixed media paper.

I was watching Jake Parker videos while drawing these from photo reference. I didn't aim for realism just a likeness of the different leaves. The top row left to right: Oak, Ash - Botton Row Left to Right: Maple, Birch.
Colored pencil, pen, soft pastel on sketch paper.

A pen drawing using color inking pens and IDentipens all from Sakura brand.

Opaque watercolor painting on mixed media paper.

Colored pencil drawing on watercolor paper with a watercolor background.

I have drawn more but I think that's enough for now.

I hope you enjoyed these drawings, if you did please +1 on google plus and show other people.
Thank you!


~ God Bless~

~ Firefly

Few Tutorials and Challenges!

Over the last week I followed a few tutorials and did a few "challenges".
I hope somebody likes them!
Enjoy!

1. The Lighting Challenge

I have done this challenge before a few years ago, and described my process but this time was a little different. This time I also used a different media for each angle.

2. Following Tutorials By Mark Crilley.

I first followed his current (as of May 30th) tutorial on How to Draw Baymax From Big Hero 6 (Must see that movie else you're not living life right!). After that one I followed How to Draw a Mouth/Lips Front View. Lastly I followed How to Draw a Mouth/Lips 3/4th View. I showed him (via internet of course!) and he said they were beautiful! I feel cool enough to do this.

I used 2 different HB #2 pencils (one was cheaper so it was more scratchy and made darker marks), a black prismacolor (must stay true to Crilley tradition!), cotton swabs for blending, kneadable eraser for normal erasing as well as highlights, and I broke my own tradition of NEVER using a ruler (because I in all honesty hate them) and followed the tutorial even down to using one. Which it worked out good but I still hate rulers.....I'll get over that....Eventually...Yeah..

I also hardly ever use grayscale, I do ink drawings but that's black and white. So since I don't do any of these things I'm pretty proud of my results!

3. "Right Hand Challenge" (For me it's the Left Hand Challenge!)

The challenge is originally called right hand challenge because most people are right-handed but because I am in the same category as Einstein I am left handed. ( I kid about being Einstein but he was left handed)

The point of this challenge is you draw a picture with your "favorite hand" and then try and draw it again with your "dumb hand" (the one you don't use as much). I drew something I know good, a sunflower. This actually got me feeling physically sick going against my body's natural rhythm. But I managed to finish it! - I think considering I'm not ambidextrous at all this came out pretty well.


Just a normal pencil.

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May God Bless You, Your Family, Friend; Along With The Health Of Yourself, Family, Friends, And All Who Know You. ~ Amen

~ Firefly

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