What I Use To Draw (Coloring)

I have no advice to give anyone about coloring their work. I don't know anything about coloring. I don't know anything about color theory, my only color theory is that if something need to be colored, then you should color it. I don't know how to color anything digitally.

Back in the late 80's I colored my Pirate Corp$! covers like this: I'd take the train to the Staten island Ferry, then took the ferry into Manhattan, then the R train to Union Square to go to Giant Photo and pat to have the cover art transferred to a clear sheet of acetate. Then I'd go home, flip the acetate and paint the back of the sheet animation-style with cel paints bought from Pearl Paint on Canal Street. When Sarah moved in with me she took over painting the cels until we got a computer and she started doing all the color work digitally. The Milk and Cheese trading card set was done on acetate "cels", 55 paintings including the chase cards. It was like we had a little animation studio going during the weeks that was in production. The process took a long time. So digital coloring was a godsend. No more acetates, no more cel (and acrylic) paints, nothing had to dry.

Maybe one day I'll learn how to color something on the computer. I'm not holding my breath. I do color many of my pinups and commissions -- sometimes a rough color sketch for a cover or a character design -- but I never learned how to effectively apply color other than just doing it and hoping I don't mess it up. It's all intuitive, and a lot of what I'm coloring are my characters, who have set colors. I just try to make the colors attractive and effective, I don't understand color theory or contrasts or cool or warm colors or whatever the heck. Whenever I do look this stuff up it goes into one brain and right out it into the air. No retention. I just try to fill the line art with color and hope I don't go out of the lines too badly.

I only use two things.

AD Chartpak Design markers - I've been using these for so long that I can't remember exactly when I started picking them up or why I chose to use them. It may have been that they were available at a store on Staten Island. We never had a lot of art supply stores back in the day but now there are none here except for large hobby stores like Michael's. I'm pretty sure the reason I started using them was because the bright colors matched the look of comics and animation fairly closely in my mind. And they flow over ink and brush pen lines without smearing. Apparently they were/are mostly used for concept art, fashion, advertising comps and the like. I don't see or hear about many artists or cartoonists using them for commissions or at conventions, I'm sure someone out there uses them besides me but I haven't met them yet. I know folks like Copics and their equivalents. Copics are more expensive and when I bought a light blue one to try out I had trouble with it smearing my ink lines. I'd love to buy a batch of Copics and try them out as well as other markers but I don't have the money or time to mess around with anything but my tried and trusted weapons of choice. I pretty much color like I'm working in a coloring book. AD markers serve that purpose for me.

Above: Ink and AD Chartpack marker drawing done on a 3" x 5" index card. 

Prismacolor colored pencils - I've also been using these for a long, long time, and it's a similar case as with the markers I use, I'm used to them and they do what I want them to do. Or, at least what I'm capable of doing with them. I don't know how to do much but fill in-between the lines I make with pens. I like the softer look of the pencils, although I haven't been using them much for anything other than effects on pinups and commissions. Sometimes I use a pencil to add to a market color, or use them to punch up the colors on flames or smoke.

Above: Ink and Prismacolor colored pencil drawing done in a 3 1/2" x 5" sketchpad. 

As always, this is what I use to draw with. There's a lot of art supplies and tools out there, what I use might not get you the results you're looking for. Try stuff out and see what happens.