Posts Tagged ‘copic markers’

It can moo like a cow, how about you can you say mooooo?

Ok, sorry, I just had that Dr. Seuss book in my head and couldn’t resist. Can you tell I have small children?

But seriously, I learned soooo much at the Copic Certification class today. It was so worth the four hour drive. I just wish I’d had time to visit with more people in the class and do some of the make and takes next door! But, my kids were waiting at the Great Wolf lodge, and the water slides were calling my daughter’s name. I have an amazing husband who let me go to a coloring class while he was at the water-park with both girls.

So, just a FEW things I learned that a Copic marker can do:

1. Color fabrics. Now you want the “perfect” color of ribbon? Just keep white ribbon on hand and color it any of Copic’s 322 colors. If you heat the fabric the alcohol will evaporate more quickly so it will not bleed as much. The red inks will run, but the rest of them will stay put on fabric! This will not work with the airbrush though because with the airbrush the ink is dry on impact. You have to saturate the fabric with a marker to die the fabric. In the below photo Marianne is proving to us that the ribbon will not bleed when dropped in a glass of water.
2. You can buy an empty set of markers, fill it with food coloring and colorless vanilla, and use the airbrush to decorate cakes!
3. You can mimic “water-coloring” with the markers. Use a plastic palette and pool the color(s). Then fill a water brush with Copic’s colorless blender solution. I only played with it for a few minutes, but it definitely felt like water-coloring. I think this is one instance though where you want to use watercolor paper because otherwise it seems to bleed outside of your lines too easily.
4. You can do all kinds of cool effects with the colorless blender. For example, I brought a bear stamp and we used an old rag with the solution on it to get great “fur” texture. I’d seen Marianne talk about this on her blog, but for me it was a see it to appreciate it moment.
5. You can color surfaces like acrylic and even make custom colored brads!

I will share a few more things from class, probably Sunday because tomorrow night we will be driving back home. And of course I hope to demonstrate more of the techniques as I master them. Some of them are going to require quite a bit of practice!

I’m so excited my Copic marker certification class is right around the corner! Next Friday I’ll be in Kansas City, learning from the master, Marianne. Yesterday’s card was done with Copic markers, but with the exception of the baby it was pretty much just colored in. I decided I better try something more challenging before the class so that I know enough about my limitations to ask good questions. One of the things I have to ask her about is the colorless blender. It did wonders for putting highlights back in the dress, but it also causes bleeding, so I’m sure I’m doing something wrong!

I tried to do the little girl’s dress in BV00, BV04 and BV08. But I found them too difficult to blend. So I ended up using BVOO as my base and shaded it with C3 and C5 in the grey family. Then I also used B32 in some of the very shaded areas of her dress. All in all I used way too many markers to list here, probably around twenty.

After I finished coloring the stamp (Stamps Happen: Collecting Sea Shells) I cut it out with Nestabilities. And matted it with purple from the DCWV Glitter Stack. I created the embossed background by applying Milled Lavender Distress Ink to the front of the Cuttlebug folder. The sentiment “Hello” is from Cuttlebug, I outlined it with a white Inkessentials gel pen.

Sweet and simple, well aside from the illustration which took me several hours last night!

Yesterday it was raining here in Oklahoma, like much of the country, thanks to Ike. So, I spent my free time playing with my new Copic Markers. I’m not finished with the card design, but I’m using the in-progress stamped images to show off my camera.

Now, it is important to be clear that I’ve re-sized these to 72 dpi which is WAY under the original resolution for either camera. But, that is what I normally do to process shots for my blog and I want to see what kind of improvement the camera adds to the workflow.

This first shot was taken with my old Canon. The stamp is “Party Animals” by Penny Black. My daughter’s Kindergarten class is called the “Giraffes”, and I thought I’d make a batch of birthday cards. First of all, on my Copics, I am loving having 72 colors to choose from! And they are a dream to work with. You will be hearing a lot more from me as I learn to work with the Copics. In fact, I’m taking a certification class from the famous Product Manager “Marianne” in a few weeks. I’m showing six sets of colors here. I colored the dog in warm yellows, the giraffe in cool yellows and browns, the turtle in a wide variety of greens, the present and ladybug in pinks and reds, the balloon in blues and purples, and the cat in blues and greys.

This second shot was taken with my new Nikon DSLR. In the full resolution images the noise factor in the Canon was very obvious. And the level of sharpness improvement with the Nikon was easy to see. Now that they are both downsized to 72 dpi a discerning eye can still tell which photo is better.  Look at the focus especially on the eyes of the giraffes and look at the noise in the wall on either side of the illustrations.

In the close up images it is very apparent which is taken with the Nikon. Now, the Nikon does have manual focus capability and I thought I’d have to use it. But, it turns out that both of these shots were taken with auto-focus, and I didn’t even have to coax the Nikon along!

See the clarity difference?! And the color difference?! I’ll be doing a ton less tweaking of the color and contrast in Photoshop! The only problem is that now you can see where I colored outside the line! I didn’t even realize I’d done that on the giraffe or I would have cleaned it up with a white gel pen. That will teach me to start wearing my glasses. I only need them to read medicine bottles, well and color I suppose.

The reason for the improvement is not the pixel ratio of the camera. The biggest difference is the sensor size of the cameras. Any DSLR would make this impact in low light situations where a flash would blow out your highlights. But, I’m quite happy with my Nikon choice!

Copic has been around forever, the markers are a must have tool of the trade for artists and architects. There are over 300 colors in all, but they are usually sold in sets that build upon one another. They are a little pricey, so I’ve been coveting them for a couple of months. I had just bought one “skin colored” marker, until CHA!

I already have Bic markers and recently bought the Prismacolor set and my one Copic marker to work on my blog banner. (An artist friend, Alice Trainor, drew it and I colored it in.) I made one mark with the Prismacolor marker and after trying the lone Copic pen I boxed the Prismacolors right back up. Sorry, but there was just no comparison to the way the ink flowed and their brush tip. I decided I’d have to buy the Copic markers a few at a time on sale at Hobby Lobby.

Little did I know they’d be at CHA! They were right by the Ranger booth. My sister Lisa stumbled upon them and came to tell me about them. I was like, “uh-huh I know what they are, you mean you might want some too?! OK, let’s go look!!!!” I was like a kid in the candy store hoping sister-mom wanted some candy too because it would take both of us to make their minimum order.

Marianne Walker, a product specialist for Copic and author of the blog ilikemarkers.blogspot.com, put together some CHA specials. She hand selected the most popular colors and created some collections just for scrapbookers and card makers. First she created three mini-sets of 12 colors each, earth tones/pastels/primaries, which will be great for Christmas wish lists! For those that want to have a cost effective full set of colors, she created a set of 36 which will compete nicely against the Bic and Prismacolor marker sets. And for the color connoisseur, she created a larger set of 72.

This was new color bundling just for CHA, so you have not seen this particular selection of colors yet. If you want to put this on your Christmas list, and your store does not have them, let Lisa know at least by mid October because there is a 6 to 8 week lead time! I can’t wait to get mine!