HOW TO DRAW COMICS:
INKING WITH A BRUSH pt 5

Continuing the real-life saga of one man’s struggle against his art materials!

A couple of weeks back I promised I’d talk about the tendencies of the brush, but it hit me that before I do, I need to discuss the different ways you can move the brush using different parts of your body. Each has its advantages and disadvantages, so you should try to learn them all if you can.

Inking from the fingers means leaving your hand stationary on the paper, keeping your wrist, elbow, and shoulder motionless, and manipulating the brush with only the movement of your thumb and forefinger (you’ll notice your other fingers move to an extent, but this is mainly in support of your thumb and forefinger).

Your fingers are the most sensitive part of your arm and have incredibly fine control, so this technique works great on small details, like when you have to draw facial features on tiny figures and it’s important to maintain a good likeness.

In fact, because your control is so great with this technique, it’s tempting to rely on this technique alone. The problem is it only allows you to draw small – you can cover about half an inch square at a time with maximum control – so inking an entire page like this, besides being slow, tends to give a choppy page without much cohesion. After all, it’s difficult to get a sense of the overall picture when you’re only seeing half an inch at a time.

In addition, if the line you want to make is longer than half an inch, you’ll end up with a stuttering line – you have to draw part of the line, stop, reposition your hand, then try to continue the line at the same angle with the same pressure on the brush – very challenging if you want a smooth continuous line, and much more difficult than drawing the full line all in one stroke.

This technique does work well for inking short strokes and dots if you’re going for a textured approach to the subject, but even then you’ll probably find working with the next technique more flexible.

The next technique involves drawing from the wrist. In this technique, you keep your forearm, elbow, and shoulder motionless and use your wrist as a pivot around which you move your hand back and forth in a semi-circular motion. The effective angle through which you can pivot your hand is probably only about 30 to 45 degrees, but this extends your reach to between 2 and 4 inches with good control.

You may not have as great a control as drawing from your fingers alone, but this technique allows you to draw longer lines and curves more naturally. And when combined with using your fingers in the same stroke, you get good control and can cover a reasonable surface area without having to constantly reposition your hand.

I find this the best method for general comic inking.

Next Wednesday: More ways to control the brush as well as an introduction to some of the kinds of strokes you can make with a brush in: Inking With a Brush, part 6!

Ex animo!