Pen and Ink Journal (entry #2)

Pen, Ink Acrylics, Sketching Journal

a.k.a. The Grimoire, Wizard Book, Book of Surprises.

The idea of filling 242 pages of a blank art journal is very daunting. I had a basic plan. After watching the TV show "Face Off" I remember the judges asking the artist 

"What is your back story?" 

Having an idea for the book is crucial. I knew I wanted it a little "dark" and mysterious.

That being vaguely understood, I knew the book was going to be more than just a book with different pictures.

 I narrowed down my art supplies and gave consideration to books that are old. I thought 

"not a lot of color". I decided to stay within a very small color palette. 

Walnut ink, black, and maybe 2 or 3 additional  colors. 

I'm getting ahead of myself...

Leave the first 6 pages blank. I didn't do this a regretted it later.

After you finish your Grimoire, you will want the early pages for a title page, table of contents, and perhaps a few pages of explanations or whatever.

First step is to number every page.

Second, I divided the book into chapters. 

DO THIS IN PENCIL!  This will change! I found some chapters I enjoyed illustrating more than other pages, so the chapters grew or if I disliked the drawing, it shrunk accordingly.  I like drawing animals so it wasn't too difficult to find approximately 28 different LOCAL animals. 

The chapter called "HERBS" was more difficult and not as much fun so I assigned lesser pages.

That being said, part of the challenge was to draw what I didn't necessarily WANT to draw. An example is, I do not like drawing architecture. I would turn the page and see I next had to draw the archways on our front porch. UGH! But it forced me to learn how.

Thirdly, I would age the papers, approximately a dozen at a time. In this book I used walnut ink. I purchased it on line. I practiced with 4 different types and this is the one I liked the very best. 

To "age" the papers I used a 3 inch paintbrush, dipped into the watered down walnut ink and spread the watery ink over the entire page. While it was still wet I would further distress it by adding walnut crystals and concentrated ink in blobs. When dry I would drip alcohol ink, stencil, stamp, and age some of the edges by inking.  I ironed them flat many times.

Doing this before you do the drawing helps. The alcohol inks bleeds through the paper onto the back and also several layers under that. If you've drawn something you really like, you might end up with a  large ink stain right in the middle of the piece. 

So distress first. 

That being said, I would often go back after I finished the two page layout and distress further.

Below you can see  numbered pages and how the alcohol ink bled through from the page before. 

Next, again using your pencil, write (on as many pages as possible) what you think you are going to draw on each one. I did most of the pages with a two page spread, so instead of painting 242 separate pictures, I labeled half of that, about 121 pictures. Some of the chapters I marked with a vague outline of what I thought I  wanted. I wasn't sure of what was going in, but I wanted to assign a certain number of pages so the book would flow.

I labeled this page "Florida Cougar".

I'm trying to get back to painting on canvas but I've started  

a new journal (THANK YOU MOM!) that is 366 pages!

 WHAT?

 Yes, I have managed to age only 21 pages so far. I'm still in the experimenting stages of trying to find out what will work on this "Heavy weight, Handmade, Linen Paper" that is almost two feet tall by a foot and a half wide! This one will be a big project!

Literally. 

As I mentioned in my first post about the ink journal, I love having something that is 'assigned' to work on each day. 
This takes the pressure off, of trying to figure out what to do.

More to come!

xo
karen