Ink

Like most people, I first learned to draw with graphite, many decades ago. But it wasn't very long until I started drawing with India ink--commonly just carbon black in water, but often with something added for durability, like shellac. My first drawings were mostly done in basic drafting classes at a vocational college, but later elective work included illustration techniques like shading, stippling, hatching and air brush. One of the first, harsh lessons that ink taught me was the penalty for mistakes. Erasure of ink is very difficult, if not completely impossible. But ink gives wonderful results, a great range of values, and ink can be brushed, applied with a pen, blown (airbrushed) and so on to achieve a wide range of effect and textures. Making illustrations taught me care using ink while gaining enough experience to reduce mistakes. 

In the heyday of illustration, a century or more ago, pen and ink drawings were common in mass media. Magazines and newspapers were a huge market for illustrators' work. And so ink drawings were the rage because they reproduced so well in black and white. No need for expensive color processing. Today pen and ink used much less often. Nonetheless, I like doing pen work from time to time. 

"Salisbury House," ink on paper, 8x10

For example, "Salisbury House," is an ink and ink-wash drawing from several years back. It began as a lightly drawn pencil composition which I inked first with a pen to show basic outlines. The dark masses were brushed with ink, sometimes diluted to half strength or quarter strength, sometimes full strength. 

"Kerry," in on paper, 5x7

 

 

 

A considerably more casual and sketchy drawing is "Kerry," done in a pocket sketchbook in less than ten minutes. In this particular work  I used a technical pen while scribbling and hatching for dark masses. This is about 5x7. 

 

 

I like cartoons enough that I once had the fantasy of becoming a cartoonist. While that pathway was enticing, in the end painting was my major passion. Nonetheless I still do a cartoon once in a while, just for the fun of it. This one is a parody of perhaps the most famous underground cartoon of the hippie era, "Keep on Truckin'" by RCrumb. I drew this parody using a dip pen and ink. Dip pens have a steel nib that you dip repeatedly in ink, unlike most technical pens these days. And unlike tech pens, nibs allow variable line thicknesses, a real asset in experienced hands.