Coloring Fur

Today I wanted to show you a simple technique that people who have taken my Certification class are familiar with. This is a great way to add texture to anything you're coloring- it doesn't have to be done over marker, you can try this over pencils, over patterned paper, or even onto plastic or metal to add texture. This is also a fun way to add speckles to Easter eggs, without much mess.

Coloring Fur with Nasty Rag
For some reason I kept thinking of a shaggy bear today, and so as I drew him he was holding something and it happened to be a fishing pole. I have no idea why that came to mind. Anyways, I started by coloring him with a base color of E31 and then scribbled over it E33. It doesn't look furry enough, so how can I fix it?

I could scribble on a darker color, but that gets time consuming, and I still don't think it would look textured enough. If I wrinkled up a paper towel and soaked it in blender solution like I did with my bushes last month it would make his fur look lighter. That wouldn't be too bad, but I really want dark fur.

Enter Nasty Rag.
For this technique I take a darker brown, in this case E27, and I lightly color the tips of the fibers on the old rag. You can see why we would call this "Nasty Rag" once it's covered in permanent blotches of marker from all shades and colors. Copic markers are permanent on fabric, so be sure that you're using an old rag. I've found that old terry-cloth washtowels make great nasty rags (If you really want to clean it when you're done you'll need to rinse it in rubbing alcohol).

While the dark marker area is still damp I'm going to carefully dab it onto my bear. Whenever you do this technique you'll have better luck if you do this first because it's easier to fix your mistakes. Look now at how my fur really is starting to be rough and textured. The more you soak the rag, the larger the blobs. If you try to add the texture while the lighter colors are still damp you'll get a much softer, washed out look. If you want longer fur, try dabbing on something with longer fibers than this stubby rag.

Keep dabbing and layering colors until you get the look you want. Try to color only small areas of your rag at a time and it will be easier to control as you dab it on. For my final drawing of this rosy-cheeked bear, you can see how the texture I added really makes the fur pop out. Notice how dense the dabbing is down on his leg. To get it this dark I have to color onto my rag and quickly dab it onto the paper. I hope this gives you some good ideas of how to add simple texture to your work, have fun playing! Paper: Neenah Classic Crest, Ink: Multiliner 0.3 mm, Extras: nasty rag