Texture Series: How to color textures with Copic markers

 

Today’s Feature:
How to color a house drawing with Copic Markers!

 

 

Hello Copic readers! In our previous blog, we showed how to draw and outline a house using our Copic Multiliner pens. In today’s blog, we’re going to complete the drawing by coloring it with our Copic markers! So, without further ado, let’s grab our materials and get started below!

 

 

The first thing you’ll want to do before coloring your house is establish your color palette. Since I already gathered 6 different reference images for the previous blog (above image), I’m going to select marker colors based on those 6 images. But, where should I start?! Since there are 358 different Copic colors to choose from, picking your palette can be difficult and daunting. So, what I like to do to avoid this color-picking frustration is to choose a mid-sized set to work from, like the Copic Sketch 36 piece set (the Classic 36 piece and Ciao 36 A also would work well). This set covers ALL the basics that I use for the types of illustrations that I make, so this is one of my go-to, palette-building sets!

 

 

Using the 6 reference images and my 36 piece Sketch set, I swatched out 5-7 colors that best fit each of the homes on a sheet of marker paper. With the exception of *BG13, every color in the swatch scan above was from the Sketch 36 piece set. I definitely used a lot of the browns, warm grays, greens, and reds for my individual palettes!

 

 

Now that I swatched out colors for each of the 6 homes, I have a better feeling of what colors I want to use for my drawing. That being said, the majority of the colors I chose were from the same reference photo I used to create my drawing. I thought I might want to change up the colors from the original photo, but after all the swatching, I realized I liked the original and wanted to stick with it. So, in the end, my final palette includes the 12 colors seen above.

 

 

Now that we have our color swatches picked out, it’s time to start coloring! I chose to color this in a similar way to the photo, with the poke-out area closest to the street the lightest brown color, E33, and the rest of the house that sits further back in space with a mid-tone, YR24. I then used G21 to fill in the grass, and the darker green, G17, to fill in the bushy plants near the front door.

 

I also used E09 liberally throughout the drawing, using it for the key red-brown accents that frame the majority of the windows and rooflines. The darker brown, E29, was also used in many places, like in the front door, roof above the front door, and other trim areas throughout the home. I applied everything with one layer so far, but will be going back over these single layers in the next steps to create contrast!

 

 

The next step after our first layer of color is quite predictable: adding the second layer of color to key areas in the house. Meaning, outlining the bricks again so that each brick rectangle stands out, and by using the Super Brush nib to flick a second layer of color downward to create a shadow under the various roof and trim-lines. By adding a second layer of color, more contrast can be seen and the more realistic the home starts to become!

 

How I colored the sky: Using the Super Brush nib of the B32 color, I made vertical lines from the left side of the composition to the right, moving the marker at a slow and consistent speed up and down the paper until the entire area was filled with B32. After one layer of color, the sky will look streak-y. But, with one or two more layers, the color will even itself out.

 

 

The final step in our coloring process is to add another layer of everything! This will help soften any of the marker streaks that are still present, as well as make the entire composition darker and richer (the more marker layers = the darker the color becomes). This includes:

• For the sidewalk, I added another layer of W3
• For the front area of brick, I added more E33 to create shadows under the dark E09 trim
• I added two more layers of YR24 to create rich shadows around the E33 bricks at the front of the house
• I added more layers of W7, W5, and W3 to the windows
• I added two more layers of G17 in the bushy potted plant
• Added more E09 to the front doors
• Added two more layers of B32 to the sky to make sure that the streaks are gone

 

I also drew in a house number to the blank plank above the front doors, just to give this drawing a little extra character! Feel free to add any other last-minute details now that the layering is almost done (and so is the drawing)!

 

 

And with that, we wrap up today’s blog! If you’d like to color the home you’ve seen throughout this blog with your own set of markers, print the above template here on an 8.5 x 11 inch sheet of cardstock or marker paper (one that’s suitable for alcohol-based markers and layering), and put your skills to the test! Once you’ve colored your own version, share it with us on social media using the hashtag #CopicWithUs, or tag us @CopicOfficialUS on any social media platform! We can’t wait to see what you create!

 

 

 

Stay tuned for our next blog, where we’ll be moving on to an entirely NEW topic: learning the basics of Copic Ink!
Until next time!