Drawing a picture to color- Low Tide on the Oregon Coast

OK, enough of you wanted to know how I drew the picture in this morning's post. Here is my typical process whenever I draw anything.

Smooth, tight paper. I used color laser copier paper and started with a rough pencil sketch.

Pencil. I draw very lightly with a blunt pencil so it erases cleaner. Erase with a soft eraser, holding the paper on one edge and carefully erasing in smooth even strokes (no scrubbing back and forth). This keeps the paper and ink lines from getting ripped.

Ink. I ink over my pencil lines with a Copic Multiliner 0.1 mm. For thicker lines I will grab a slightly larger pen, or just go over the line twice.

Photocopy before I color. In this case I scanned it into my computer, because I didn't know what size I'd like to color it. Sometimes I touch it up in Photoshop if I need to fix stray lines or pencil that wasn't erased. Then I printed it at a couple sizes and chose one I liked.

Choose Colors. In this case my color palette was chosen by the color rules for E33. Otherwise I would choose colors that matched real sand/nature better (E42, W3, etc.). Many times I go digging on the internet to look at a photo and see what colors will be in real life. For the plaid on yesterday's card I watched the video of the Monty Python skit and worked from there.

If you want to try coloring this picture, go for it, just note where you got the picture from. Send me a link of your colored copy.