Copic Tutorial.warning: this is a long post!

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I have been too chicken to do one of these before, besides the time it takes.. wow!

anyway i was asked by the girls at stampARTic online magazine if i would do an article for them. and if at all possible if i could do a copic tutorial…

so here it is…lol.

this has already been posted on the stampArtic blog, and you may have seen it already, but if you haven’t then you can find it here and  on my new tutorial page..

I have tried to make this as short as i can but to still be informative.. but it is still long..and repetitive.

i find that pictures explain things far better than my waffle..lol.

PLEASE NOTE

i am not copic certified or qualified in anyway or form, this is just to show you how i work with my copic markers, and hoping that you find it of some help.

Well first things first. you  will need to stamp your chosen image. (mine is a magnolia image.) I use Memento tuxedo black ink with my copic’s. The paper that i use is canson manga art boards. (again not everyone’s choice..just mine)

the colours that i like to use for skin tones are E000, E00, E51, and E11. you can by all means use any combo you like but this is just what i like to use.

i start by adding the lightest colour first, while trying to imagine where the light source is coming from.

I then use E00, a slightly darker shade. not going quite as far as the first colour.

E51, is next.. again, slightly less area is coloured in.

then the darkest shade is added, E11. i use this as my shadow.

I then add my cheek colour, i sometimes do this first before any colour, depends if i remember or not..

go over the whole face with your lightest colour again in a small circular motion, (in my case E000) this blends all the colours together.

one finished face.

just do all the other skin parts the same way, try and visualize where the light source is coming from.

start with the lightest of your colour choice and work your way through to the darkest of your colour choice.

remember after this stage just go over the whole area again in small circular motions with the lightest colour to blend all the colours together.

here is the arms complete and the start of the top. again start off by using the lightest of the colours that you have chosen..

the way that i choose my colours (apart from the skin) is to pick the main colour that i want to use and then pick colours a shade lighter and shade darker than my main chosen colour, for the  shadow and light.. i.e… for the t-shirt my choice was Y35 as my main colour I then went on to pick the colours y32 and y38 as my contrasting colours, not leaving to big a gap in the shades.

you can mix any colour combo, but I’m not that brave at the moment. this is just the way that i pick out my colours.

add your next shade not going as far as the first.

then add you darkest colour, if you have more shades in between that is fine, just keep going as before.

last but not least go over the whole area with the lightest colour to blend.

I work in small areas of my image at a time so that the ink stays wet and blends smoothly.

i coloured the rest of the stripes on the top the same way,

the trousers are done exactly the same way again. i will show you one leg to show you. and so you can see what i mean when i say i work small areas at a time.

this is the main colour added.

remember if you keep going over and over the same area with the same colour again and again your colour will darken.. just a word of warning.

last but not least i add the darkest colour where i want my shadow to fall.

this is what the trouser leg looks like once i went over the whole area with the lightest colour.

this is the image with the skin and yellow area’s complete.

I wanted Tilda’s little bee hat to be black, don’t colour your area with one shade of black as this will make your image look flat. instead use different shades of grey..( that’s what i do..)

using your lightest colour first. My Choice is  W4

layer the colours like before ( lightest to darkest)I used the colours W4, W6, W8, and W10 for the hat

again remember to go over the whole area with the lightest colour to blend the colours together.. (W4 in this case)

a closer look

and start all over again for the stripes in the top.. again visualising where you think the light source is coming from.

this is the different layers of colour before again using the lightest colour to blend them all together.

(i used the same colours as the hat)

the top once blended together.

The hair.

colours that i used are E21,

E25

E27

E29

all blended together with E21. (the lightest colour)

for the wings i used C0 and C1 you can’t see to well on this picture but i haven’t gone as far to the edge with the light colour as i have done previously as i want some white  to still show.

this picture shows where i put the darker shadow colour.

after this stage just go over the two colours with the lighter C0. to blend, but again don’t go to the edge.

because i want the edges to look blended and not bold lines where the colour meets the white.l i use the copic blender pen on the whole wing area, this blends the greys into the white.

I do the same kind of thing as the wings with the outside of my image.this is the lightest colour i have gone the whole way round the image.

using the next darker shade pick out shaded area’s

more shading with the next darker colour.

( i have shown the colour pens as i used them in the picture.)

finally add a tiny amount of the darkest colour that you want to add.

go over the edges of the different colours with the lightest colour again to blend them.

finally go over the whole outlined area with your blender pen 0

this will make the edges blend into the white paper more seamlessly, and lighten and  blend the greys together a little more..

do the same thing with the ground area to give your image something to stand on.

hope that this has been helpful. sorry about all the pictures. but i couldn’t see any other way of explaining it..

Here is a completed card with the image.

I have popped this into my copic tutorial page so it is at hand without trawling through all my cards…( if you look on the right hand side of my blog at the top. you will see the copic tutorial tab next to the home tab.. )

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Tags: Magnolia