fancy a $1 bargain or two?!
We’re having our very first Tadpole Tuesday today at TLP where selected products are available for only a dollar each for the day! You can pick up my old favourites Doodled Buttons and Newspaper Alpha 2 (vintage) for a buck a piece (about 50p in “real” money) along with a new doodle pack America the Beautiful for only a dollar – bargain! (Check out the rest of the Froggy Finds section while you’re there, there are plenty of fab deals to be had)
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Jessica and Sarah both asked about how I create my doodles, so while I was making the new Americana pack I snapped a few pics of the work in progress. Here’s how I do it:
- Armed with a list of the doodles I want to make (thanks to my CT and TLP CT for helping this poor Brit out with ideas for this pack!) I use a sketching pencil to sketch out the ideas onto a medium textured, medium weight cartridge paper. I have a constant struggle trying to find a paper that has enough weight to hold watercolours (and all the other stuff I throw at it) with enough texture to create some depth to my drawing, but not too much texture that the drawings lines end up wobbling about everywhere! I think I have pretty much found a compromise with this 220gsm paper now.
- Once the doodles are all sketched out, I either go over the pencil with a black pen, or if I’ve really piled on the pencil when working out the design, I trace my finished outline onto another sheet of paper. I’ve used Pilot Drawing Pens here. Then I rub out the pencil lines and I’m ready to colour.
- The first stage in colouring is to lay down a base wash all over the doodles. Sometimes I use watercolours, watercolour pencils or my favourite Inktense pencils for this stage, but here I’ve mainly used watercolour style marker pens as I want a really rich bright colour. I have a mixture of pens in my collection, but for these doodles I mainly used Marvy Le Plume II (the small nib at one end is really handy for tricky little bits).
- Next stage is to work over the first wash of colour to add more detail and some definition. I used some more pens and some hard (ish) pencils here to build up the colour. One of my favourite effects at the moment is to lay down a lot of pencil pigment and then work over it with the pen, blending everything together (warning: this technique doesn’t do the pen much good, it needs a good clean afterwards and the nib takes a bit of a hammering too – definitely not something to try with your favourite pens…) Rubbing soft pencil or pastel pigment into the paper is another fun way of building up some interesting effects. And giving satisfyingly grubby hands too
- Often by the time I have finished adding the shading the original outline isn’t as defined as I want it to be, so I end up retracing over the black again before scanning everything into PhotoShop
- This is the bit I enjoy the least: extracting and cleaning up the doodles, bleugh! Sometimes I also need to change the colours slightly if I’m working to a swatch. The only good part about this stage is cleaning up any lines where I’ve made a mistake in the drawing and seeing the “proper” doodle take shape, other than that it’s incredibly tedious!
So, that’s the process in a nutshell: lots of washes and layering of colours and media to build up the design. And lots of messy fingers and happy accidents, and a few disasters thrown in for good measure (think full cup of tea knocked over my desk, keyboard, and almost finished sheet of doodles…..shudder. It brings me out in a cold sweat just thinking about it. Thankfully it has only happened once and my kids were in bed and so didn’t hear the rather naughty words that came out of my mouth… I had to kiss goodbye to those doodles, PhotoShop can only save so much – an entire sheet of tea-coloured runny-inked drawings is beyond even its magical restorative powers. Sigh.)
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I’ll be back on Friday with more waffle and hopefully a matching alpha for the American doodles! Have a great week
love this post! cant wait until friday!
This is such a great post Katie, it’s really nice to see exactly how you do your fantastic doodles as I had no idea!
It was fascinating seeing how your doodles are made! Thank you for taking the time to show us.
Wow, that is so cool! Thanks for sharing the process. I love the new doodles!!
Only 50p you say? Somehow I spent a hella lot more than that
Fab post, now all I need to do is learn how to draw, LOL
Hot damn, girl, you came back to your blog with a BANG, didn’tcha?! BRILLIANT post! Makes me all kinds of happy to see the creative process
Wow! Very inspiring! Makes me want to dig out all my old art supplies again… or shop for new ones!
Those erasers are my favorite. I still have a small stash of them I hoarded from my old job! 
Your work is always so stunning. So cool to see all that goes into it!
I agree with Kim! It is inspiring and I’m going to put that inspiration to work! I’m impressed with your mad watercolor skills. I tried my hand at it recently and it is harder than it looks! Thanks for sharing this! Love the new product; the $1 special is an great addition to TLP shop. Not that I need the incentive to shop there; it is the cream of the crop.
While I missed the sale, I must say I enjoyed reading about your creative process. Keep up the good work.
Wow – that is such a cool process -I have always wondered! You do such a great job!
I think it’s neat for you to share your work-in-progress process! And although I am not a creative person to draw like you do, I’m definitely going to share this post with my DD1 who looooves art! She’s going to get a kick out of reading how you blend pencils and watercolors and whatnot!
Kate, I really enjoyed reading about your process! It was fun to see what goes on “behind the scenes” as you create your wonderful doodles!
Thanks for sharing.. This is so cool.. It really gives me such an appreciation for the work seeing all the time taken to create.
Hi Katie! I have been a fan of yours and I am so much amazed to know that you are doing this the *hard* way. I was thinking all along that you were using a tablet when doodling. Wow! You are one amazing, talented girl! Keep up the good work!!