textures without using a pen or brush

[Brian W.]

The other day, while working on a practice/warmup page, I "discovered" a new texturing technique. I'm sure it's probably old hat, but I thought it was cool!

I accidentally ran my hand through a line that was really wet. I attempted to dab up some of the ink from the page with an old bandana I keep at the table for just such an occasion. Well...I accidentally dabbed the inky bandana on a part of the page that was clean and noticed it made a very nice denim-like pattern. Since the figure I was inking was wearing jeans, I applied a bit of this along some shadow areas and it looks really cool.

I am familiar with the use of razors, toothbrushes, and sponges. I've seen some work by Jay in which he used his own fingerprint(very cool).

Anyone else have some 'non-standard' trick to create interesting textures?

Can you say "cool" more that I did in your reply!! ;D...thank goodness I'm not a writer.

[clockwerkj]

make an "afro" brush. If you have a size 6 or so red sble thats old & busted. What you do is cut it straight across the belly of the brush. dip in ink, wipe on a paper towel & viola, instant frizzy tight hair. it works for smoke trails & stuff too.
Jay

[tschloendorn]

I love things like this.
Keep them coming.
The best I can offer has already been mentioned,which would be sponges.

[Brian W.]

I saw a tutorial once on how to use a razor bade to gouge out paper around and inked "explosion" to break up the outline. If anyone knows the tutorial, I think a link would be helpful...thinking about it, it may have been on youtube.

[Brian W.]

Holy cow!! It's been wayyyy too long since I was here!

Life has a way of getting like that!

Anyway, I found the tutorial I was asking about and thought others might enjoy it!

Happy ink slinging!!

[TomParrish]

Good find Brian! It's such a cool technique, I tend to use an exacto knife for it, and out of sheer paranoia I throw the lines away from my body instead of towards. One thing he doesn't mention that is important (in case anyone else is reading this that hasn't tried it before!) is the paper quality - You need decent boards to try this on otherwise you'll go straight through the paper with ease when first starting out!

Speaking of textures, I recently had a lot of fun 'inking' a rust texture with a black wax crayon, and just got myself a grease pencil/chinagraph which has proved to be pretty awesome too

[Brian W.]

Tom

Thanks for the heads up on the paper quality!

Very cool with the wax crayon for "inking"

I've seen some stuff from Jay where he is creating textures with what looks like a colored pencil. Makes a very cool "dirty skin" or smudged metal sort of look. Saw it quite a bit in his X-men run with Greg Land.

I hope we can add more "non-traditional" tips in here so comic fans will continue to recognize that inkers are pushing the envelope of what goes to print!

[clockwerkj]

Yeah I do a ton of stuff with col-erase, veri thin & regular prisma pencils. Lately I've been also doing a ton of marker & inkwash. When you see the next arc of uncanny you'll see what Im talking about.
J

[TomParrish]

Look forward to seeing those Jay! I hadn't thought of using the Col-erases for inking - I use blue and red when pencilling and have a couple of black ones kicking about somewhere so may have to have a play!