Playing With Acrylics in my Hahnemühle Books #hahnemühle #dinawakleyacrylics

  Part of a morning warmup.

I used Bristol Smooth paper from Strathmore

and swirled on some cabbage roses. 

All the pieces in this post were made with

 Dina Wakley Acrylic Paints. 

Added in some leaves and tendrils.

Probably not finished,

I will most likely come back and add more

elements to all these pieces.

 Another piece on the Bristol Smooth.

Some of the same colors, just in different

combinations. And apparently no leaves or

tendrils. Hahaha! Just now noticing that.

I can add those. 

 I took some square shots so I could post them

on Instagram. 

I can see some black pen work coming for this one.

 Then I moved into my

Hahnemühle Kraft Book.

I love this paper! 

I did a complete review of it here. 

It just felt like a swirly day, so I worked

on printemps - incomplete. 

Lines and white dots. 

And the square post for Instagram.

Dina's paint worked great on this paper.

The Kraft Book pages are 55 lbs, but I was

working wet paint onto a dry surface.

No additional water and the paper handled

the paint wonderfully. 

The Kraft Book can be purchased here

and here. 

And in my review I used a whole bunch

of other art tools and techniques. 

 I wanted to see if I could get similar results with

the Grey Book from Hahnemühle. 

Paper in the grey book is 55 lbs. - the same as in 

the Kraft Book.

Again, I was working wet paint onto a dry surface.

I did actually cover the entire page with rolled on

ink before I started, but that paint dried super fast.

I had no problems with the paper at all -

it handled this color great. 

I did use a bit more paint to get some texture,

and as it dried I had little bumpy warps

on the back side, but that fixed itself with the

book closed.

I  haven't reviewed the Grey Book yet,

but it is coming so stay tuned!

So far I like it a lot!

The Grey Book can be purchased here and here.

Now, onto making more squiggles and roses

and hey! I'm working on a sail boat, too!

And it's on a Hahnemühle paper!

Be sure to check out the art books from

Hahnemühle. 

You won't find any better anywhere.

I promise. 

Glass Dip Pen and Ink

 A couple months ago I started seeing glass dip pens

in my Amazon feed. 

So of course I had to check them out.

 I think I paid $8.00 for this pen on Amazon.

They had boring in the $3-4.00 range,

 but I wanted pretty. Since then I have seen some

glass dip pens online that run upwards of $150-200.

I will never have one of those. Hahaha!

But I do wish for one. 

I like Fire Spider Glass's website - they have a cool

pen with a jelly fish design. So can not afford them.

I watched a YouTube video that ran 1:20 and

learned enough to make this drawing.

Hahaha! That's about the length of my attention span.

I already had these inks. 

Sometimes I use them for

backgrounds, but I had never drawn with them.

Liquitex Acrylic Ink and Daler Rowney Liquid Acrylics 

both worked great!

 It is as simple as dipping this pen into the jar of ink,

wiping the excess off onto the lip of the jar,

then holding the pen like you would any pen -

and you draw!

There! I saved you watching a 1:20 YouTube video!

You are welcome!

They did suggest being careful not to clink the two

glass items together very sharply in case you

get breakage. That would be sad.

 Figuring I was going into the unknown,

I thought I should stay with something safe -

like the tangle narwal. 

I drew the framework using two different ink colors.

Then I started filling in the sections with - - - 

what else? Printemps!

Ta-da!

 (I am impressed I remembered to take photos.)

Here is a shot of what the pen looks like inked.

You really don't do anything other than stick the

pen down into the ink and pull it out,

wiping the excess on the rim.

The ink sits in those little grooves and does not

fall off the bottom. I promise.

But don't write straight down at a 90 degree angle -

because it won't work. 

Hold it like a regular ballpoint pen.

 Class is over for the day.

Hahaha!

 I tried every color I had that wasn't boring - like silver and black. Ugh. 

I will probably never use those.

Ever. 

 I hadn't used the sepia color yet, so I started outlining the

whole narwal to tie it all together!

Once you are done with one color, dip your

pen into a container of water and swirl it around.

Then wipe it dry on a cloth or paper towel.

This will keep your pen clean and keep you

from cross-mixing colors you don't want mixed.

Unless you want to have a whole jar of mud color.

My hand slipped as I made one of the curves,

so the whole thing now has a thicker border.

That way it looks like I planned it to be that way.

Yep!

Glass dip pens may just be where it's at -

here in Maine. 

Now if I could only justify spending a small

fortune on the jellyfish pen.

Hahaha!

One Big Whopping Mess

A mess party? Yeah, buddy! I know how to throw one!

Actually, I am taking a one week online class with Carla Sonheim. You know Carla? She's the lady with the awesome drawing and painting books about Imaginary Animals, The Art of Silliness, and The Drawing Lab - all for mixed media artists. I love her work! This week she's teaching a class on gelli plates. (No, not a jelly jar, not a jelly plate - - - gelli plate. Google it.)

Because she makes her living teaching classes like this - I won't go into specifics and how-to's, but I do want to show you what I did with today's assignment.

We were supposed to make eight pages. I liked it so much that I made sixteen! It was a big whopping mess! But so much fun to do! I can totally see me doing this all over again tomorrow.

These are two pages (7"x10") that I made. Don't you love the textures? And I totally think that little green sticky-outy thing on the right looks like one of Shrek's horns :). Am I right???

I like the texture in that pink section, and those blues with the pink streaks were total accidents. At least the first one was, then I figured out what caused it and did it on purpose after that :).

These two pages were from the very first set I did. That page on the right is going to be a wonderful underwater tangled garden. I don't have any idea what Carla is going to have us do with our pages we made today, but that one on the right is mine!

These last two pages were my absolute favorites! Blue, a little white, some teal, some of two different shades of pink. Yep! I think I'm going to love this gelli plate thing! And tomorrow we get another lesson. I can not wait! Yay!!!