What's Best?

Well, I have to apologize profusely to everyone. I've been neglecting my Blog shamefully, unfortunately I had to go into the city which is 2 hr. away for my daughters hospital appointments, and then I had a Library class to run not to mention all the other fun stuff that is involved with being a homeschooling mom! For today I've decided not to do a card. Instead I decided to post something which might answer a few questions I've had in the past. Which Art medium is best and what are the differences? Now I don't know about you, but I love to see close-ups of the different techniques people use. I especially like when you have a repeated image with all the different types of techniques so that you can compare. I have not seen to much of that so I decided to do one myself. Thus my title. Which one is best? I have no clue, its all a matter of perspective. I just know that depending on the look I am going for, that's what I use. So to start, I used the image of Ollie and Olivia from Stampendous which you can purchase at All That Scraps . I colored it in using 3 different mediums.

If you look at the above photo's you will see that the image was colored in with Copic markers. Now the first image was colored on Shimmer white CS. the ink in both images is Adirondacks Pitch Black. For the shimmer sheet, the ink soaks in faster and blending is not easy. I tend to use a light color and then a color just one tone deeper. I keep the lines fairly clean, I go over the darker portions with the lighter to achieve a better blend. When using the Copic on Shimmer CS if find it just mesmerizing to look at. The color is bold and strong. The second image is stamped and colored on SU Whisper White CS. I blended color by keeping the areas wet and blending the dark into the light with the lighter marker. I also picked up darker color with my light marker from a plastic pallet. Now as you can see from the picture of the markers, I use both Ciao and Sketch Copic. What's better? It depends. The Sketch hold more ink, and you can airbrush with them which produces an even smooth backdrop to your colored images. So if you want Bold Beautiful color then Copics are great.

The next series of three photos is using water color. There are two variety's shown. The first is a more true variety of water color. It uses reinkers. The blending is smooth, the color bright, and the look of it is bold yet kinda dreamy. It is a softer look with the same bold color. I use more traditional methods to color with my reinkers. That means I might do washes of color, or wet on wet etc... The second method is my pseudo water color with markers. It is not as smooth in the blending you will always have more texture to it. But on the other hand it is convenient and still bold and lovely to look at. For the markers, you can use Tombow, SU and any other water based marker with good pigmentation. For the reinkers, any one will do. Use SU or Ranger distress or any other brand you might have. As long as the pigment quality is good, you will have good results.

The last method shown is Color Pencils. The first image of this type is shown in the traditional Gamsol magic technique. I outlined the color and then blended using stumps and Orderless Solvent. Now let me make something very clear. It does not matter what kind of Orderless solvent you use. I use an art store brand as well as an eco orange scented one. You don't need "Gamsol" which is just a name brand. The other thing is that any color pencel will blend. The result is dependent on the amount of pigment in the pencil. If you buy a cheap pencil, you will get less than colorful results. Red's may come out looking pink and so on. I use for my work Prisma artist quality pencils ( a wax based pencil) , Faber and Castel ( a German oil based pencil) , and Derwent. All of these are artist quality and each and everyone will yield beautiful results although Faber and Castel have an extra butteriness that I love. Now back to the pictures. The first as I said is outlined and blended and has that typical Gamsol look that we all love. But for the second one I used the blended solvent and then went back over with color pencil to add more color and texture. I love using color pencil over gamsol because it adds such depth to the image.

Now I know there are so many other mediums I haven't touched on yet such as Twinkling H2O which would go under the heading of water color with mica sparkles, and chalk or pastel. Both of these will be touched on later.Thanks so much and hope to be back posting a card soon.