Qsilv

This is a thread started from a chat between Chelydra and me but EVERYONE's invited to chime in.

Qsilv

http://www.thinkdraw.com/picture.php?pictureId=149332 Chelydra's "(th)inker"

1. chelydra wrote:
thinking about inking... partly cuz I have a computer-graphix job I'm avoiding... nostalgic for when inking really was my job...
2. Qsilv wrote:
Rapidograph 0000... Speedball w/ quill nibs... ;>
3. chelydra wrote:
i think it's a french brand that starts with a c... in reality i've switched to antique pelikan fountain pens with special flexible fine points (for figure drawing mostly)
4. chelydra wrote:
but also rapidographs
5. Qsilv wrote:
...in reality I love the feeling of graphite and the glow of silverpoint
6. Qsilv wrote:
but Pigma Micron for fiber, in ,01 and .005, non-bleed, archival.
7. chelydra wrote:
Is that silverpoint grading??? My best results actually came from ink and brush - brush does pretty much everything a pen can do only better...
8. chelydra wrote:
W&N Series 3A is best, with Aurora fountain pen ink (dense black but water-soluble, won't wreck brushes).
9. Qsilv wrote:
Metalpoint does make lovely tonal areas, but it's the potential delicacy of lines that intrigues me. Brushes... mmm.. puts it in the world of watercolor, doesn't it? Or sort of calligraphy with riggers...?
10. chelydra wrote:
To be continued... There's one of my long aimless anecdotes waiting for you when you have the patience and I'm past my digital deadline...
11. chelydra wrote:
I think we need a regular forum feature for discussion of non-digital media and techniques... whaddaya think?
12. chelydra wrote:
Or is there one already?
13. nancylee wrote:
What fun to eavesdrop on this conversation!
14. bluemoon wrote:
indeed! and you can establish your own subject on the forum..
15. Qsilv wrote:
lol... well this is THINKdraw, and they did make us a forum category "General Discussion ---Art, puzzles, links, and everything else not related to Think Draw." 2 threads might apply": Who is an Artist (80 replies but all in 2009) and Question for Actua
16. Qsilv wrote:
Question for Actual Painters (Feb - Aug '10) with some wonderful content. But yep, BEST is to use your exact phrase "Discussion of non-digital media & techniques".
17. Qsilv wrote:
I'll start it up now, and copy this content into it. The problem with comments attached to pix is if the pic gets deleted... pfft.. it all goes away. ;p

Qsilv

For reference --

http://www.thinkdraw.com/forumPosts.php?topicId=743 - Question for actual painters

http://www.thinkdraw.com/forumPosts.php?topicId=7 - Who is an artist?


(and yes Rachel.. if you're peeking in here at all while the munchkin naps, this is another of my bids for a properly search-able Forum!)

chelydra

Hi - well, you ARE an efficient quicksilverfish... here we are already, all set up and ready to go... I could write all night but have to either digitize or sleep... mountains of details to remember about CMYK vs RGB and INDD vs PDF vs PSD, and that's the easy part that I sort of understand... It occurred to me tonight (while my brother in law was complaining about buying a digital alarm clock that made no sense, and then finding wind-up or electric (mechanical) Westclox classics for sale on line, solid and reliable and easy to grasp (to hold and to understand both)... that preparing art for printers has undergone the same transformation as alarm clocks...
It used to be that you assembled a THING - a flat thing, made of layers of paper and wax or glue, columns of text from typing machines, half-toned photos, black line art - but a thing nonetheless. This THING - a physical object, which you handle and look at and understand at a glance - then got placed under glass and photographed (using a humungous lens, about 3 to 6 inches in diameter), and from the negative you burn a plate, wrap the flexible metal plate around a roller, and add ink and electricity and behold you get a newspaper or whatever you're printing... and this I'm describing is offset lithography, which was itself a revolutionary new technology, a step away from heavy metal clattering and cranking and groaning and steaming toxic fumes of the good old days of hot type.... and that in turn was a revolutionary technology too of course, displacing scribes and draughtsmen in their monastery cells and studios, who made books by hand for millennia... Every step of the way we get a little more abstract, and a bit further from physical sensory involvement with out hands and tools and materials... Like even the wind-up alarm clock displaced roosters and dawn sunlight telling our ancestors wake up...

but all this is a rambly procrastination because that accursed digital job is still looming... rambling on about stuff everybody knows already... just so I won't have to go back to the templates and digits and stuff...

I hope I haven't suffocated the discussion before it starts...

Qsilv

(shaking head and laughing) ...you have not.

I happen to disagree (of course!) which will be fun. I love both worlds... the tactile mechanical physical one, but the ephemeral digital electronic one too. And yes, I have truly worked with both.

There must be something extraordinarily special in the overlapping part... and I'd venture a guess that that's the core of ThinkDraw.

But, like you, I need to get some things done before waxing eloquent here. This'll keep. ;>

five

Personally i like the reed pen i made back when i was taking classes. Still have it. I like silverpoint but dislike prepping the grounds. Also the reason i don't use egg tempura much even though i like the effect and making the paints is kind of fun. Too much sanding and prep. And my boards often warp. Oh heck. All that prep is probably why i don't paint that much with actual paint.

chelydra

Hope to start adding to this before long... still buried in a (digital) job...

chelydra

I was about to launch into my long-postponed (perhaps more accurate than long-awaited) sermon but then was reminded the digital jobs is still waiting...
hang in there, don't go away... (and feel free to add whatever)

chelydra

I decided to wait for Mum to get us properly started here. Might be a long wait, but I'm sure she can handle it. C'mon Mum. In the meantime, people can read our discussions on my villain and maybe kid pictures, if you need a fix and can't wait around another six weeks.

mum23

Well, this is a bit embarrassing… I had the temerity to express an interest in reading more on this thread , and here I am being thrust into the limelight like a lamb to the slaughter… or am I mixing my metaphors?

Seriously, even though most of what’s been said sounds like a foreign language, I was looking forward to seeing where this thread was going... it’s fascinating reading. I’d be happy to chime in, maybe, IF (and it’s a big IF) I felt that I had something to say that would actually make a contribution.

I've been painting with pastels for about a year now. I love the results I'm getting with them, but it has whetted my appetite and I'm now interested in finding out more about everything. Before I bought the pastels, I did try an acrylic painting. It was spectacularly unsuccessful... I laugh now to think that I thought I was cheating when, in frustration, I thinned the paint with water as I was finding it so unwieldy straight out of the tube! One day, I'll try it again. I love what people do with watercolour and oils too, and yesterday I saw a painting which had been done in egg tempera. It was gloriously rich; the depth of colour was breathtaking. That goes on the list of things to try one day too!

I started with the pastels because I found a very cheap student-grade box and thought I'd try them out. From the outset, I found that working with the pastels felt as natural as breathing... it just worked, even with the extremely limited set of colours I started with. That initial feeling spurred me on and it didn't take long before I knew that I'd have to move on to artist-quality materials and do this for real. As I'm homeschooling my children, I have to fit the painting in around that, so the fact that I can just put them down and leave them whenever I need to, without worrying about paint drying out, makes them perfect for me at the moment. They are very forgiving and it is relatively easy to correct mistakes, which is just as well!

Having got started here, I could go on... but is anybody actually interested?

Let's hear from you and see what you work in, what you like about it and why. This could become a fantastic discussion, maybe even a source of inspiration ...

five

Hi, Mum.

Look at Odilon Redon ... he's well known for his pastels. Also, Degas. They used soft pastels, which are mostly pure pigment (gum binder) -- hence the richness. I feel the need to give health heads up, though. Be careful with these around the kids ... a fair bit of pigment dust is given off. Many colors are toxic, and inhaling very small particles is not healthy anyhow even if non-toxic. You should be in a very well ventilated area, preferably outside (some pastel artists use a respirator as a precaution). Also store bought fixatives are toxic; use those outdoors only, too. Most fixatives yellow some over time, I like Lascaux brand best. Better yet, make you own ... you can find some recipes by thru Google. Redon (and Degas, I believe) did not fix their last layer, to maintain the rich color on the surface. Makes the work more fragile, though. If you frame behind glass, use spacers so the glass is lifted off the piece or the glass will lift the last layer up (fixed or not). If you are using oil pastels, try oil sticks for greater richness (but around the kids avoid oil mediums for diluting the oils.

With acrylics, retarder (to slow drying time) and acrylic media for thinning and different effects are your friends. Golden brand has a good selection. You can thin with water, but the acrylic media give you more options. That said, I personally have never been able to avoid the plastic appearance, even when I tried mixing my own acrylic dispersions. I almost always end up layering oil paint on the top (don't use acrylics on top of oils; it won't last long).

I think we all have a medium that is more natural for us depending on how we tend to see and approach drawing/painting. Each medium takes play and practice.

chelydra

Hooray!
One last push to finish off this digital job - it's taking forever for reasons too tedious to explain - and then I'll take over for a while (as I tend to do, but it feels good not to for a while!)

chelydra

I spent so long fussing with this CD packaging that I missed the deadline for Christmas sales. However, anyone who want to give it to friends or family or ex-lovers can order a copy and I'll provide a nice certificate you can put in the mail or into stockings. It's a quite remarkable little opera, mixing all kinds of musical genres, that gets better and better with repeated listening until finally it seems (to me anyway) to be the equal of Gilbert & Sullivan or Brecht & Weill. Called Civilization and its Discontents (title lifted from a Freud book) words and music jointly composed by Eric Salzman and Michael Sahl, on Labor Records (distributed by Naxos, available via iTunes also). I oput the cover art on my facebook page - name is Van Howell, but it turns out I'm not the only Van Howell in the world (or on facebook) so you might have to poke around a while before you find me.

chelydra

I know it's inappropriate if not actually verboten to plug commercial enterprises but this has gone on so long and so far past any time I was getting paid for that it doesn't count.

mum23

Thanks five.

I hadn't heard of Odilon Redon. Although I don't particularly like most of his paintings, I love his use of colour, and will definitely study them more closely to learn more.

I appreciate your warnings about the pastel dust. I'm very conscious of it (approaching paranoid! ) I work very lightly, mostly on a horizontal surface and have used relatively smooth supports to date, which means that I generate very little dust when I work.

On my last painting, I used fixative for the first time. I was using a new support which felt lovely to work on, but the first time I took it outside to get rid of the dust, half my picture fell off! This one was going to be mailed, so I thought I'd better redo it and fix the bottom layers. I was actually horrified at how the fixative darkened it and killed the colours. I wouldn't dream of using a fixative on the final painting after seeing that. I'll look into making my own too... hadn't thought about that before. Another thing to learn... have started to do my own framing too, as having it done professionally is prohibitively expensive.

I think you're right about some mediums being natural; pastels certainly feel that way to me. It's fascinating learning as I go along. It may sound silly, but when I try something, such as laying one colour over another, and it works, I get little butterflies of excitement and it spurs me on... it's very addictive! I just need more time!!!

... speaking of which, I shouldn't be here now. Looking forward to reading more though... C'mon folks! There must be more of you out there!

five

Good that it excites you! A couple additional notes:

Toothier (rougher) paper/supports will hold the pastels better (meaning less need for fixatives). It's the tooth that helps pastels stick to the paper.

You can also try pressure fixing the pastels (I have not seen this work all that well, but perhaps you will have more luck) by laying paper/film (you'll have to experiment to find a paper/film to which the pastels are less likely to adhere) over the top and placing weights (heavy books could work) on top. You may still have to redo the top layer afterward for brightness of colors.

I've also seen some people try lightly spraying the back of the paper (not the front where they are applying the pastels) with water as they work to pull the pastel more into the paper. Again, I have not seen that work all that well either.

Some of the darkening you saw fades away with time and experience making sure you are only spraying it very very lightly. I also had plenty of problems with drips and droplets from fixative when I sprayed but I did get smoother over time.

With soft pastels as it is hard to have a good idea how much dust is given off as the dust is very small: your eyes truly can fool you. You can also track it on your clothes, shoes, etc. without being aware. It's almost inevitable that it will be in the area in which you are working. See, I am more paranoid. BTW, you should wear gloves. It's best when you can to actually work outdoors. You can check toxicity of the different pigments (e.g. do they have metals in them, has the element used for the color been considered cancer causing).

chelydra

I find all dry media disagreeable and distressing, mainly because I'm aware that whatever I'm doing is likely to turn into a big smudge if I don't look after it like a sleeping baby forever.

But I love toxic pigments, and although I feel guilty about poisoning the earth with palette-scapings, I find the nastiest materials often give the best results. Two experiences gave me this conviction: When I was about eleven, I ran out of yellow in the beginner's oil paint set my grandma gave me for Christmas 1959. My father went to New York for business once a week and found a replacement, but was shocked at the expense - it was W&N artist-quality cadmium yellow medium. $2.50 a tube! Just looking at it made me feel blessed, exalted — astonished at marvels of the universe I hadn't known were possible. It redefined the meaning of 'being an artist' - from learning the skill of making pictures to basking in this erotic radiance, absorbing it into eyes mind and heart, and re-emitting it back out into the world.

Much later, circa 1978, I resumed painting in oils after several years, and the results were discouraging. Flesh tones looked chalky and dead. I just couldn't get portraits to come alive. I had no idea why. Besides my own leftover paint from art school (mostly WN & Rembrandt) I had a box of hand-me-down s student-grade tubes, also about ten years old. When I ran out of all my white, I found a big old battered tube of Grumbacher Pre-Tested Flake White, which I would normally not have allowed in my studio, but there it was, so I tried it, very reluctantly, expecting the worst. But lo and behold, my paintings came to life at last! Later I realized that the awesome portraits by old masters depended on lead oxide for their rich, deep, luminous skin tones. I've never used any other kind of white since that day, and I buy up all the lead white tubes I find in shops, assuming it will be banned before long. I think part of the appeal of Grumbacher's is that it uses only linseed oil, not poppyseed or sunflower, so it's got that faint hue of amber most paint manufacturers try to avoid,

Genuine vermillion is about twice as expensive as any other color (except lapis lazuli, the original ultramarine blue, made of ground-up semiprecious gems) - it's mercury sulfide I think, and probably twice as toxic as any other pigment But it's also wonderful for portraits, even though it's reputed to decay into a dull blackish shadowy mess after a while.

Not all the colors I love are toxic...
Sap green (a mix of all sorts of pigments, probably pretty harmless), burnt sienna (made of yellowish-reddish Italian mud, probably safe enough to be edible), and Indian yellow... Indian yellow, by the time I found it, was a synthetic imitation of the original, which had been produced by torturing cattle in India, feeding them nothing but mango leaves (which I guess share the rich deep colors of the fruit) and prohibiting them from drinking any water - and then collecting the resulting phosphorescent urine drying it to powder and turning it into paint. I guess the cattle weren't usable for any other purpose and didn't long survive, so it was pretty costly. I imagine Hindus were not too pleased by their colonial masters' abuse of these sacred animals, so the process probably didn't help the pigment-makers' life expectancy either. By the way, all sorts of pigment mixtures can be called sap green or Indian yellow, and that Sienese mud probably comes in many different hues. Winsor Newton seems best for getting these particular colors just right.

I found the best way (for me) to get a painting started is to dilute transparent pigments with lots or turpentine (it has to be pure "gum" turpentine by the way, available at hardware stores, and stay away from petroleum-derived paint thinners if only because they don't have that wholesome pine-woods scent) and
use big soft brushes to make a crude sloppy drawing. I start with burnt sienna, and gradually use a bit of Prussian blue, Indian yellow, and maybe some alizarin crimson and sap green. Then when I have a nice luminous semi-abstract rendering, I use some flake white (or Cremnitz white, which I think might be even more pure lead oxide than flake) and only after the forms and spaces are established I start using other pigments. I've been told I do "great beginnings" - and the best results usually come when I allow this first layer to dominate the finished painting.

Most of my paintings have been on masonite, which is like the wood panels of the early-to-middle Renaissance masters but less prone to warp and crack. Be sure to use untempered (not tempered) masonite. I think it's made from pressure-compressed sawdust, basically; it's been around since the 1920s. Coat it with any kind of gesso so it's not too absorbent, and so the natural pigmentation of the wood/sawdust doesn't invade the colors. If you prefer canvas, avoid cotton canvas, use only LINEN, and stretch & prime them yourself. Do NOT prime canvas with gesso. This sounds horrible, and it is, but sizing with rabbit-skin glue is the first step after stretching. You buys a bag of rabbit-skin crystals, and boil them a while but not too long a while. The steam fills the house - and it is horrific, because it really is what the label says. Brush it on warm, thinly and evenly, lightly soaking into all the linen fibres, but do NOT let it stand and thicken and do not slop it on, or you'll get a glassy surface that's prone to crack and decay. The reason you need to 'size' the canvas is that the linseed oil in the paint is actually made from linen seeds; it's the same species as the canvas, and when members of the same species get together they always get up to mischief; they mix and mingle and the next thing you know they've produced unpredictable offspring. In the case of an unsized canvas, I guess this would means the paint and the linen start to merge after a while into something that is not quite like either of its component parts.

In priming masonite, I've tried some of the ancient powdery gessoes, with varying results. There was a kind made with marble dust among other things that just flaked right off. Another produced a lovely soft surface than felt like clean expensive white sheets, and it stayed on the surface nicely, but it was so absorbent that there was no way to make changes to the first layer of the painting. Oddly enough, it was cheap acrylic gesso, with a hard glassy surface, that worked best for me. I could use a rag with a little turpentine to keep re-working the first layer of the painting, using the resulting transparency to get a nice stained-glass luminosity. (On a rigid masonite board, that glassy hard coating is not a problem, but on canvas it could be, since it's not as flexible as the canvas itself.)

The other thing you need to know is that (oil) paintings have to be painted either all at once (Franz Hals was about the only old master that used this approach), or else in carefully constructed layers. The care part of that concerns only that the oily, glossy layers have to be ABOVE the thin, matte, lower layers. The bottom layer needs to be thinned with turpentine and very little or no linseed oil added to it; it's also a good idea to avoid using oily glossy pigments in the lower layers unless they're thinned down a lot.

Oh I forgot to mention - lead white is really indispensable for underpainting. It's strong and touch and flexible. Titanium white will work, but it deadens the colors. NEVER use zinc white or ivory black for anything except the final, topmost layer; these are notoriously glassy and brittle, and any paint on top of them will crack right off. The only reason to ever use zinc white is to paint snow; it's ultra-white, to the point of looking very cold and and even slightly blue - kind of like the kind of dead-white they advertise in detergent commercials when you want your hubby's shirts to dazzle his boss and clients, and you want your sheets to look germ-free.

I should mention one other thing, which is that I've never really mastered oil painting, and most of my work is either black-and-white (pens, or ink and brush; I haven't used graphite pencils in years and hate charcoal) or else watercolors (sometime reinforced by colored pencils). But because I've been so timorous about getting back into oils (after long periods of never touching the stuff), I get obsessed with the craft of it. A big book by a guy named Meyer seems to be by far the best guide. Others are more detailed and pedantic but Meyer is more useful, from what I've read. Reed Kay, who was head of the Boston U art school when I was there in the 1960s, wrote a good short book that might still be available.

Footnote: The reason I said to avoid cotton canvas is that you generally tell from fifty feet away when a painting is on cotton. The colors look flat and soft and lifeless. If you can't afford linen, try masonite.

mum23

Interesting reading! I've been reading similar reports about pigments from pastellists, many of whom say that the synthetic pigments just don't match the nasty ones for brilliance.

It would be easier to ignore the toxicity for the sake of a better result if you are working with paint, which you are unlikely to ingest accidentally (or even deliberately, come to that!) but I'm not willing to take the risk with the pastels, just in case we do breathe their dust in.

Five, I decided to use Art Spectrum and Rembrandt pastels because they say that their pigments are all non-toxic, and they are (apparently) upfront about the chemicals they use. Since reading your post, I've looked up the MSDS for both brands and there is nothing to indicate that there is a problem with these pastels. I also tried looking up a few individual pigments, and couldn't find any that sounded sinister.

When I've finished painting, I always wipe the area with wet paper, and thus far haven't found any traces of colour except where I could see it, where I may have knocked some off the edge of the painting. I really do work very cleanly, but can see that some supports will generate more dust, and that when I work on an easel, there will be more chance of dust being produced.

I do want to find out more about the risks involved. Is there a single reference that you know of which lists the pigments and their toxicity and/or carcinogenic properties? If not, I'll look further myself, but I thought that you might know of one...

I pressure-fixed the successive layers on the painting which I mentioned earlier by laying glassine over the top and pushing it down very firmly, and carefully, with the heel of my hand. It didn't seem to affect the look of the painting at all, and I was told that there was no pastel dust in the packaging when it arrived at its destination. When I was looking for non-fixative solutions, I read about a successful and famous (although I've forgotten his name) pastel artist who used to put his paintings under glassine, ensure that there could be no lateral movement between them and then put them under a rug on his floor for several months, so that the foot traffic above would push the pigments in very firmly... not sure I'd be game to try that!

Chelydra, do you need to gesso the backs of the masonite boards to prevent warping?

Thanks for the tip on the turpentine! Turps gives me a headache almost instantly. I know that there is an odourless version available, but it is basically still a fairly nasty product. I'd never heard of the 'gum' turpentine you mentioned... it sounds much friendlier.

Lots of good stuff here... keep it coming!

five

Off hand, I don't know the name of a source that lists toxicities (I recall there is one, though) .... it might be in Meyers (which Cheldrya mentioned). I look at the element that makes up the color, e.g. cadmium yellow is cadmium based, and then I looked at the bottle of dry pigment to see the warnings. (Once upon a time, I made my own paints ... hence my fixation on the dry pigment). California, for one, is hyper about the warnings manuf are required to put. Well I used to look; I don't use paint or pastels much anymore. As we've noted, with pastels, there is the added issue of inhaling the tiny particles of dust that can lodge in the lungs. I have pressure fixed pastels and had chunks fall off relatively soon thereafter though not necessary immediately.

On brilliance of paints, the main issue is how much filler is in the paint. There is a lot of filler in student grade paints. Filler makes the paints cheaper, but you end up using more. Anyhow, the less filler the better and more brilliant the paint. Personally, I love Old Holland paints. $2.50 a tube ... I've paid way way more than that! Though it was for some amazing colors.

Something else to know about us verse the old masters verses us... our paints are machine made and uniform in the distribution and size of pigment particles within the binder. The old masters made their own paints by hand, and so the particles are not uniformly distributed; the variation effects how the light hits the surface and passes through the layers.

Lead white? Yes, it's better color wise than titanium white but I would not use it. I end up with paint on me (and I hate wearing gloves to paint). I can see accidentally touching my mouth, etc. Really, once in the painting zone, I am not paying attention is some paint ends up on me.

Paint an X on the back of the Masonite for each layer of gesso on the front to prevent warping. On gesso, there is nothing more beautiful and perfect to paint on than a well done polished marble dust (Calcium carbonate? I forget what it is) surface! Nothing! But it's a pain in the but to achieve and if you are off on the process, it's flaky and dry. Meyer I think has the process. Short hand if I recall: Use rabbit skin glue as the first layer. Then mix the marble dust exactly as instructed on the bag. Exactly like baking. Then layer one smooth thin, even, non-overlapping strokes all in the same direction and let dry. Repeat in the opposite direction at least nine times alternating directions (if you were doing it horizontal the first time then vertical the second layer, horizontal the third, etc) Sand from rough grit to the finest grit. Buff. You may also have to sand in between the layers -- I can't remember. It should end up like porcelin. Just perfect. And so, so much work. If you go this route, do a bunch of supports at the same time.

Qsilv

Wow! this is turning into the most compactly rich reference! Lovin' it!

Mum, do get yourself a copy (used even) of the old "bible"
The Artist's Handbook of Materials and Techniques by Ralph Mayer

National Bureau of Standards should have stuff on toxicity levels.

Gum turps comes from pine trees, vs mineral turps being synthetic. Pine's organic so it can still be a helluvan irritant, but I used it AND lead and all those other toxic things for years... and I only twitch slightly... (joke, folks... I'm annoyingly healthy 'cept for a bad back from falling off too many horses). Mind you, I did take care not to point my brushes with my lips.... ;>

ok this was pure stolen time... having way more to do with business than chemical toxicities . I . have . no . life . . . ! ;-p