Colored Pencil: 6 Easy Tips- Improve your Grip for Better Coloring

Colored Pencil: 6 Easy Tips- Improve your Grip for Better Coloring

Want to improve your colored pencil coloring?

Ok, so you’ve tried a few colored pencil projects and you can’t quite seem to get the hang of it. It looked so simple, it’s a pencil after all. So you buy some of that magic solvent stuff and blend the heck out of your project with a paper stumpy thing. But that just makes a slightly greasy smear and it’s paler than the original. So instead, you try…

Realistic Coloring: How to add authentic texture to your Copic Marker and colored pencil projects

Realistic Coloring: How to add authentic texture to your Copic Marker and colored pencil projects

Do you blend everything smooth?

My latest Copic Marker Coloring Tips video at YouTube is all about texture.

As a beginner, most colorers focus on blending skills. After all, the blends are what originally attracted you to markers in the first place.

So you dream about blending, you practice blending, and the color blends are what you notice most when you go online to look at other coloring projects and tutorials.

Blend, blend, blend.

But wait, are you stuck on blending?

Realistic Landscapes with Copic Marker & Colored Pencil

 
Get your FREE copy of the "Point Betsie" digital stamp in August 2017. Join the Free Digi Club for a new stamp every month! | VanillaArts.com
 
 

A Lake Michigan Vacation!

"Point Betsie" is a Marker Painting Workshop that introduces you to coloring realistic landscapes.

Marker Painting Workshops are NON-SEQUENTIAL!

All of my Workshop classes are ANYTIME ACCESS. Work at your own pace and repeat the project as many times as you'd like.

Get your FREE copy of the "Point Betsie" digital stamp in August 2017. Join the Free Digi Club for a new stamp every month! | VanillaArts.com

The Point Betise digital stamp is included with class purchase! My digital stamps are ideal for Copic marker coloring but they also work great with colored pencil and even watercolor. My stamps are full of wide open spaces to blend and celebrate pretty color. There are no distracting texture marks to get in the way of your creativity!

That's what the "Vanilla" in Vanilla Arts Co. is all about. I give you the vanilla base, you add the hot fudge, the sprinkles, the whipped cream, and the Copic ink!

 

Point Betsie is a real place!

Located along the shores of Lake Michigan, just outside of the town of Frankfort, Point Betsie is the warning signal that northward boats are about to encounter the shifting sands of the Sleeping Bear Dunes and the Manitou Islands.

Northern Michigan is gorgeous and Point Betsie is a point of pride for those of us with roots there.

 

Point Betsie

 Join me for a fun Copic Marker + Colored Pencil lesson in the Vanilla Workshop

Point Betsie is an intermediate skills class, that introduces you to coloring realistic landscapes

Learn to incorporate real artistry into your coloring projects, one concept at a time. Every Workshop details a new method for enhancing realism, depth, and dimension.

Each class stands on its own as independent learning. You don't have to take six of my other classes to understand this lesson.

Workshops are NON-SEQUENTIAL!

All of my Workshop classes are ANYTIME ACCESS. Work at your own pace and repeat the project as many times as you'd like.

Come color with me. It's a ton of fun!

Class Printable Pack Includes: 

  • Class syllabus with detailed recipe guide

  • Full color project sample

  • Guide to Copic base

  • Detailed color map

  • Project inspiration references

 

If you’re looking for the Free Digi Club, the program has been discontinued.

You can check out the many free resources at VanillaArts.com which include the Studio Journal Article Archives, Vanilla Beans, YouTube (demonstrations & tips), Computer for Colorers, Undercover Swatches and Instagram for Works in Progress.

 
 
"Big Sable Point" a digital stamp by Amy Shulke of VanillaArts.com. Learn to color landscapes using Copic marker, colored pencils, and a dash of point. | VanillaArts.com

Point Betsie has a companion Class!

If you enjoy coloring Point Betsie, be sure to check out my other Lake Michigan lighthouse workshop, Big Sable Point.

I've had so much fun drawing these stamps and creating these classes that I hope to make an entire series of Great Lakes lighthouses.

Both stamps use the same techniques and very similar supply lists. 

 

This Isn't Paint-by-iNumber - Change your Marker Blending Philosophy

This Isn't Paint-by-iNumber - Change your Marker Blending Philosophy

Back in the 1970’s, if you did crafts, you made them from a boxed kit. We didn’t have the internet for inspiration and instruction. We crafted by the box.

I loved one kind of box more than any other- the paint by number kit. I lived for the moment when all my weird globs of paint on the canvas finally coalesced into a prancing horse or a spray of roses.

The rule in paint by number was to stick to the numbering system. Bad things happened if you went outside the lines, put the wrong color in a spot, tried to blend two sections together, or if you ran out of paint and had to start substituting.

Up close, paint by number paintings are eye-scalding but from 20 feet away? You might be mistaken for Van Gogh… or so the box claimed.