Comparison: Recent Drawings to Older Newsprint Ones

Newsprint meets Toned Papers:

(This is the continuation of some points explored in the previous three posts) 

The Conte crayon drawings I have done on 24 x 36″ sheets of Newsprint are some of the work of mine I like best. But over the last few years I have tried some alternate media to capture what I like about them on a better surface. Here are five current drawings, done with oil-based pencil on hand-coloured paper, beside comparable newsprint drawings. 

The new ones are a third to a quarter of the size of the newsprint drawings, but the balance of line/tone, and the even-ness and luminous quality of shading are in a similar ballpark - I believe these are the closest of everything tried so far. 

But these colour ones are on acid-free paper, which is sturdy enough to allow for post-session additions and amendments, and lasting enough to make that worth trying, so I’m optimistic about the future explorations they allow. 

Summary Report: Toned Papers, Part 1

Toned Papers, Part 1:

For some time I have been exploring alternatives to drawing on newsprint. I found that for my sensibilities, drawing with Conte crayon on large sheets of newsprint had an ideal texture for direct figure drawing. But the newsprint has no longevity. 

Earlier this year I began experimenting with adding washes of ink to better quality paper to draw on. This came in  conjunction with finding an oil-base pencil, Cretacolor Nero, whose marks I liked: they are less coarse than Conte and `smoother’ than charcoals.

The early ones I’ve been doing used more muted greys with small amounts of colour mixed in, echoing the newsprint look that I have a fondness for. Also, black marks look less stark when there is some underlying midtone, rather than white paper.

Summary Report: Toned Papers, Part 2

Toned Papers, Part 2:

More recently I've been exploring how a base tone washed on paper contributes to the drawing I’m doing. Starting March/April of this year (2016), I began using washes of more vivid hues. 

I found a paper I like, Stonehenge light weight, and began using Daler Rowney FW acrylic ink for the colour washes. The drawing is done with Cretacolour Nero oil-base pencils.

There are certain limitations. I stretch the paper to wash colour on, but it’s thin enough that working in water media while drawing would buckle the surface a lot. The colour layer can come off with heavier erasing, so I try to keep erasures to a minimum.

It’s having promising results so far, and allows for a few directions of exploration, making images of people. I hope you are enjoying these as well- I’m having a good time making them. You can follow the progress of this on my tumblr.

2nd entry for Dec. 10, 2015

These are some three 10-minute studies, a 15-minute one and a 20-minute one at bottom. These are Progresso woodless coloured pencil on 18 x 18" sheets of paper. The top three are Canson Recycled Sketch, the 2nd-last is on a piece of Canson XL drawing paper prepared with a chalk underlayer and the lowest one is Canson Bristol paper prepared with a dilute ink wash.

3rd entry for Sept 25, 2015

From the top, these are three 10-minute studies, two 15-minute ones and a 20-minute one at the bottom.
The top one is Pitt pen and Progresso woodless pencil on Canson Drawing paper. the next two are Pitt pen on Canson Recycled Sketch paper.
The third from the bottom is a cool gray Derwent Graphitone water-soluble pencil on Cansion drawing
paper. The second last is Pitt pen and Progresso pencil, and the final one is straight-up Graphitone on Canson XL watercolour paper.
All are on 18 x 24" sheets of paper. Over the past while I have found some promising materials combinations, but no one has totally `clicked' as a perfect vehicle for 20 minutes and under. Maybe none other than Conte and newsprint ever will,  but I keep trying things out.

2nd entry for Sept 21, 2015

These are two 10-minute studies above, a 15-minute one and a 20-minute one. The top two are grey and black pigment pen on 18 x 24" sheets of Canson Recycled Sketch paper.
The lower two are black Pitt pen, graphite and Progresso woodless pencil for shading. Later I went over the bottom one with a Prismacolor clear blender pencil to smooth out the shading texture. These are both on 18 x 24" sheets of lightweight Stonehenge paper.

2nd entry for Sept 10, 2015

These are three 10-minute studies at top, a 15-minute one 2nd from the bottom and a 20-minute one at the bottom.
The top one is Pitt pen on Canson Recycled Sketch paper; the next two have a gray Pitt brush pen and Koh-I-Noor Negro pencil on Canson Drawing paper, and the lower two are just the Koh-I-Noor on Canson Drawing paper. All are 18 x 18". The now awkwardly named Negro pencil is like a cross between Conte crayon and a coloured pencil, but fairly soft. It comes as a 5.6 mm rod that fits a bulky pencil holder, and is a bit brittle to use without the holder.

4th entry for Aug 28, 2015

These are some 10-minute studies. the top three are Pitt pen on 18 x 24" sheets of Canson Recycled Sketch paper, with some initial help from a pencil sketch.
The bottom one is a grey pigment pen line drawing and some HB graphite stick shading on an 18 x 24" sheet of watercolour paper. it does give an airiness to the image, but I found the texture of the cold-press I tried was too strong