Out now in Artists & Illustrators

I've written an article about working with pen and ink for the September 2016 issue of Artists & Illustrators (the magazine I edited a little while ago). It's available in the UK and Ireland now.

To buy a copy or find out more, follow this link.

In the colours of Italy

We travelled out to Siena to meet up with elder daughter, who has been inter-railing through Europe. It's a relaxing few days in the sun, swimming in rivers, reading, sitting in town squares, missing the Olympics and wishing our stay was longer. The bottles of ink I had carefully wrapped so they wouldn't spill in the suitcase have been overlooked and left at home so I devote myself to the range of Posca water-based colour pens I have managed not to forget.

The pens encourage experimentation, and because they contain what is in effect acrylic paint, it's possible to layer the colours over each other in ways I haven't tried before. It's a bit hit and miss in places, but it's enjoyable trying them out. As well as the 0.9-1.3mm version, I took the thicker 1.8-2.5mm range, which I've yet to really test.

If the pens dry, as is possible in the Tuscan heat, they can be primed by shaking and pressing them on to rough paper to restore the flow. This means I create rather looser marks at times than I intended but I rather like this effect. In fact, I'd rather like to try out a broader range of their colours.

There are more of my drawings using the pens on Instagram.