March 14, 2016
20 Comments
Hiya sistahs! What a great start to the week DONTCHA THINK??
Welcome to Elaineabella’s AKA Markergeek’s blogpost today.. isn’t she awesome?
Last Monday we covered some Copic skin tone combinations and basic colouring tips, so it seemed logical to move on to hair this week! But before we get started, I’d like to say a big thank you to everyone for their lovely comments and enthusiasm following the first post! I really hope that these posts prove useful and inspire you to give those markers a good work-out. For those of you who don’t use Copic markers, do stay tuned, there will be posts using other brands and mediums that I have available.
Remember, we want to see your results too! Share your Stamping Bella colouring and cards here in the comments section of the blog, over in the Stamping Bella Sistahood chat group on Facebook or directly on the Stamping Bella Facebook page.
In the graphic below I’ve got some of my favourite Copic hair combos for you. The lovely Tiny Townie Heidi Loves Hugs was perfect for showing hair colouring as she has some really nice open areas of hair, plus she’s one of my favourites from the latest release – so cute!
Normally when I colour I tend to start with my lightest shade to lay a base down. With hair I quite often do the opposite, especially on images where the hair detail areas are quite small. With all of the combos shown above I worked DARK – MEDIUM – LIGHT, going back in with the medium and light shades as necessary. Keeping the layering and blending to a minimum in this way helps to prevent the issue of sticky ink which can result in patchiness when you try to correct it, or what is otherwise known as a hot mess (we’ll talk about ways to fix some of these issues another day).
With most of the Stamping Bella characters the hair areas aren’t very large, so sticking to two or three marker combos is generally the best approach. Keep it simple! As with colouring the skin tones, try and avoid doing too much layering and blending. With hair in particular you don’t need to blend out every line, the aim is to create some texture and to have enough variation in colour and depth to create interest.
The amount of layering you do, and the order in which you use the markers will affect the results you get. Play around, see what happens if you add an extra layer of your medium shade, or if you use a much lighter hand with the darkest shade. For example, the blonde combination shown above could be lighter if you use less E44, or if you start with E43 instead, and add in just a very small amount of fine detail with E44. It’s all in the experimentation!
Special Note: don’t be overwhelmed by images with curly hair as seen on the new EDNA stamps (and on Uptown Girls like Savannah has a Star), these can actually be the easiest and most fun to colour. Work with the lines provided by the illustrator to figure out where to put darker shading and be loose and a little messy, creating some variation and texture. Don’t try to create perfect uniform strokes, be a little squiggly and free, the overall effect will look great (remember, the recipient of your card isn’t likely to be analysing it up close with a magnifying glass ? ).
If you try out the marker combos in this post with your Stamping Bella stamps, be sure to share! We would love to see the results and hear how you feel about them. Show off your creations in the comments below and even better, share your own favourite hair colour combos with us. Let’s talk colour!
If you are posting your images using these combos, we would love to see them on Instagram and all the platforms mentioned above! To make it easier for us to find you , just use #markergeekmonday as a hashtag! If you have other favorite combos, we would love to learn from you! Leave a comment below 🙂
MWAH!
Thank you for these postings!
So glad you’re enjoying them, Carol!
Love these posts so much! I really love to read how other girls colouring and especially from Elaine, such a colouringqueen!
LOVE!!! the coloring tutorials! always looking for tips to make my cards look better! 🙂
Yay! Glad you are enjoying them Denise. I hope you will find them useful. 🙂
It is so great to get these colouring tips. Especially since the areas are so tiny. Thanks.
Another round of fabulous inspiration, Elaine, that I’m going to ‘translate’ into ‘polychromos’ speak *grin* I’m seeing some combinations that will work for a certain little Stuffies bear I’m practicing with (while I await new images to come my way!). Thrilled that you’ll be sharing pencil colouring posts down the road! Thank you!
~carol
Polychomos/Prismacolor posts coming up – just need to dust them off. 😉 Glad you’re finding the marker related posts useful though!
This is just so wonderful – enjoying all the tips coming our way!!!
Happy you’re enjoying them Caroleann – knowing they are being enjoyed gives me the energy to keep going! 🙂
They are all beautiful. I need so much help and practice with my colors. I can only hope that one day I can make mine 1/2 as beautiful. 🙂
It’s all in the practice, Mary Jo! I didn’t start out being able to colour well, and I’m certainly still improving and learning. Enjoy the process and keep playing! 🙂
Oh thank you for sharing Elaine! I so love your coloring! You have such a great style! You can always learn something new, especially from such a great colorist like Elaine! 🙂
Oh thank you Nancee, for your support and enthusiasm. So happy you’re enjoying the posts!
Thanks Elaine for the tips and colors you use! I like the tip starting darker to light on hair. I’ll give it a try!
You’re welcome, Linda! Be sure to come back and let us know how you get on! 🙂
Elaine – I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again…you are a genius! I’ve learned so much from your colouring. Hair – Dark, Medium, Light….that’s why my hair never looks like yours 🙂 I will give it a try. I LOVE Marker Geek Mondays!!!! A great start to the week, thanks!
Nope, I’ve just been colouring for quite a while and picked up tips/tricks along the way. 😉 But thank you! MWAH! So happy you’re enjoying the posts. 🙂
thank you so much for sharing your expertise with us Elaine, although I’ve had my markers for quite sometime and I was learning to use them when I first dove in head first in collecting them life happened and I had to put on the big girl panties and deal with alot of stuff, now I’m in my new place, things have settled down for the most part and when my laptop co-operates I get to play online and re-learn to use them, so happy to have found stampingbella and other great sites with so many gifted individuals such as yourself to help us learn how to get it right 🙂 big inky hugs and a giant thank you again to you and Emma for a great place to be 🙂 I can’t upload cards to my laptop currently, sooo until that gets rectified I’ll have to email them to Emma 🙂 Hope she doesn’t mind.
You are so welcome, Cindy! I hope you find the posts useful and inspiring in getting you playing with those markers again. I hear you on the life stuff – glad yours has settled down enough to let you take some “me time”, it’s so important. Don’t stress about getting it right, just experiment, play, soak up some tips and enjoy yourself! The end result is never as important as the process.