marker/brush pen transparency

[JParrilla]

Hey everyone ive recently found a new love for art markers and brush pens. They really enable me to create characters in a style I always wanted to, I can achieve a very digital looking piece with traditional material, which is something ive been trying to do for a while. One issue I have is the opacity of markers and brush pens. Its difficult for me because I am a beginner and Im having tons of trouble depicting light and shadow. I can only really make 1 level of opacity with a black marker.. 100% black :) I know they have sets of different percentages of grey which i definetely wanna try since I dont want to go into any color yet. Im wondering how I can achieve a more watercolor-like look with brush pens and markers. I really dont like copying artists style but for the sake of example Im talking about the more transparent ink look that Yoji Shinkawa gets in his art (See my Yoji Shinkawa thread for examples) Im not trying to copy him, I just think that having this transparency would make it easier to create different levels of darkness, which is definetely essential if im working only in black and white, or grayscale.

[tensai]

Pentel for example has these brush markers with water based ink. You can squeeze the tube and make ink go running etc. They have a couple of colours but you could work with a black and a grey. Then add to that one of those watercolour brushes that you just fill with water and dilute the washes more.

I don't know about that though cause it seems like you would be working sort of backwards. Normally you would built up from light to dark with watercolour or inkwash or marker pieces.

You could go with markers. Greyscale value range plus one marker filled with colourless blender to dilute/blend a bit. You will not have the power of dilution or blending like you have with watercolours and also not the happy accidents (or mess). But it's dry and quick.

But in the end if you want that transparant ink look, seems to me easiest thing to do is work with diluted ink. Or buy two brushes and a tube of watercolour paint like ivory black. One brush for applying paint, one brush for blending. It's still pretty quick and you'll have more possibilities with your values and blending edges etc.

Have fun

[JParrilla]

Thanks a lot for the advice man. I'm gonna go to the art store and just try different brush pens. I checked the pentel site for those watercolor pens they seem really good. As for using watercolors or just regular india type ink, I'm willing to try it but I really have no brush experiance at all, excvept when I painted in like the 1st grade :) but ya I'm gonna try it all and see what gets me the effect I'm looking for. Thanks again

[JParrilla]

im a little confused about how those water brush pens work.. how do you apply the water if the inks already dried on the paper? Im talkin about the ones that you put only water in.. also i have one more question.. what are the tips of pentel brush pens or similar brands made out of? I have a staedtler brush marker that has a foam type of tip thats essentially just a soft marker tip.. are the pentel brush pens actually a brush tip? or just something that bends like a brush? Ive never seen them in person so im not sure. im hoping there actual brushes since im looking to pretty much have portable watercolor paint as if i was painting with a brush