Playing with my Christmas Presents

Hope you had a great holiday over the last couple of weeks!  We had a quiet one, but it was really nice. In the little bits of quiet time that I had, I've been looking at products and techniques to try with my paints and pens and I'm working on a new acrylic on canvas mandala in orange and purple (it's not done yet, but when it is I'll share!)

Last night I decided to use my Christmas gift card (thanks Mom!!) to pick up some goodies from the art supply store to play with.  I settled on a few different items, but primarily, I got myself a bunch of open stock Tombow Dual Brush Pens.  They are a water based ink pen that can be used alone, with their blender pen (which I forgot to pick up last night...) or water.  I guess a lot of scrapbook folks like them (that's like the one craft I don't do..).   More info about them HERE.  If you search You Tube there are tons of videos and techniques (many with rubber stamping) so definitely get a cup of tea and go watch a few, there's some neat stuff to be learned!

Tombow pens in all my favorite colors! 

Anyhow, I think these are going to be my favorite way to play on watercolor paper!  They have a fine point and a brush tip.   So they're very versatile for either drawing or applying color, for what I do, which is draw mandalas.

Now,  I should tell you, I am a serious newbie to watercolors.  I really don't know what I'm doing.   I have avoided playing with them in the past because I'm a control freak.  I like predictable results.  I like perfect lines.  I like to know what's gonna happen!  Watercolors for newbies is not any of that.  But what I didn't realize is that I was missing out on some seriously intense colors!  I love intense colors!  So, I'm learning to let go and play with it.  (Seems like what I'm doing in the rest of my life...but that's another story.)

By the way, I found these pens because I was looking for a better permanent pen to use on watercolor paper to outline and draw my mandalas.   I'd tried my Faber-Castell fine ink pens and the the paper just laughed at them.  I tried Sharpies and they work great - I just don't like the way they feel in my hand.  But they really do work best for me, so that's another thing to work on I suppose.  

So I figured I'd share my second attempt with these babies (the first was pretty nice - but then I got carried away with the background so it was kind of wrecked, haha!)  

I drew my outline in black Sharpie on 140lb watercolor paper.  (As this was more experimental that serious, I just freehanded it all, not really trying to be precise).  Then I started adding color from the pens.

I left white space in between for blending

Then I used a little water on my brush and started blending within each section. 

All blended!

I kept adding, and to be honest, it was so much fun that I forgot to take more pics!  So here's how it ended up:

Ta da!

I was actually happy that the Sharpie lines were a bit thicker than I originally planned, as it added a little buffer between colors, which kept things where they belonged to some extent.

I really love the intensity of the color with these pens! Obviously, part of that is my choice of bold colors within the Tombow line; with 96 colors, of course some are going to be much lighter, gentler. I also like the way the colors blend and spread and get all inky looking. I have to get a blender pen so that I can see the difference in the spreading (videos I've seen show the blender being more subtle and predictable..which I might like!) I'm looking forward to playing more over the weekend and getting more of the colors for my collection as well!

Well, that's what I've been up to today, I plan on playing with these pens all weekend.  I hope you are creating art that you love today as well!