Thanks Erika! These types of video are really the most fun to do, and I’m planning to make many more.

Thanks! These types of videos seem to have a limited audience, but I’ll keep making them.

My pleasure!

1. Filling a sheet with hatching is good practice for complete beginners, but the best practice is just to draw what you love. In art the best way to improve is to try doing what you love, rather doing a bunch of rudimentary exercises until you get to some imaginary degree of skill. 2. I also love drawing from sculpture, particularly from the Middle Ages).

Van Gogh would be fun to study. I’ll put him on the list!

Thank you!

You’re welcome!

Thank you!

Thanks Simon!

Well, thank you for those very kind words. These videos are pretty time consuming to make, so it’s nice to know they’re appreciated.

Thanks! Cross-hatching does have a way of emphasizing individual style in ways that smooth, blended shading does not.

¡Es un placer!

You’re welcome! I will be sure to make more videos on dip pens in the future.

You’re very welcome, Sally. I’m so glad you found my channel and that you’re finding my videos, (and my way of teaching) helpful. More stuff to come!

It's certainly not the worst problem, but you don't want people thinking of another artist while looking at your work, and no one fairs well in comparison to Michelangelo.

Thank you! That’s an interesting idea to draw the human form using topographic curves. I’m curious to see how it can be blended with cross-hatching. It should make for some fun experiments!

Thanks for the recommendation! I don’t know those two artists, since my area of specialization is Western old masters. I love discovering new artists, however and will look into them.

@@mkompan I think Inoue's work in Vagabond would be particularly interesting for you. A more realism based art style that mixes hatching, ink wash and brush work.

Thank you!

Which shops? You can buy bister pigment from Kremer Pigments, but the actual ink I haven’t seen anywhere.

Thank you! Flowers in pen and ink would make a great video.

You’re welcome. My first advice would to copy who you love, whose style you would like to emulate. If those drawing are too difficult to tackle, you can try copying smaller details. For life drawing I think Raphael is a great starting point. His hatching technique is easier to do than Michelangelo’s.

@@mkompan Thank you so much! It's always nice to be reminded to follow your heart. I admire Raphael quite a lot; and I can't wait to start cracking-out my copies, and learning from them. You've really got something here! Thanks again for everything! 🖌😃👌

You’re welcome! It’s impossible to know the order in which the hatching layers were done, so I made an educated guess. Usually the base layers are the longest with subsequent layers becoming shorter and shorter as the forms are refined. But systems are for beginners at Michelangelo’s level there might not be a strict order of doing things. And yes, I’m excited to do those videos on traditional materials. Traditional inks are particularly fascinating and relatively easy to make.

@@mkompan Amazing, thanks for the insights. Looking forward for those tutorials!

The color of bistre varied greatly depends on what wood was used, with oak creating a dark brown, and birch creating a light yellowish brown, for example. Many dye based brown fountain pen inks have similar transparency and working properties. As for paper, there was quite a bit of variation in color, but yes you can still find paper made in the ild way. Saint Armand, a Canadian paper mill makes papers of many traditional colors.

You’re welcome! I’ll have to research this way of training, but to me this seems to have limited benefit since the copy is done over a “tracing” of the original. The results might be frustratingly less accurate through free handing, but the instructional benefit is greater.

The usual method was to prick the lines of the original drawing with a needle, laying a sheet of paper under the original to create the transfer sheet. This sheet was taped over a blank sheet of paper and powdered charcoal was rubbed across the surface and forced through the holes. After the pricked sheet was removed, the pattern of the dots could be traced.   Outlines were drawn first. Cambiaso’s heavy lines required a blunt quill. The quill had to be held quite upright to prevent blots. Iron gall ink dries slowly, and a line must be dry before it can be overlapped with another line without causing pooling at the point of intersection. Wet-into-wet crossings can be seen in Cambiaso’s drawing. Working on several copies helped me to understand that Cambiaso’s drawing is carefully choreographed, despite its apparent vigor. This is clear in the calligraphic lines that articulate the torso of Jesus. When all the lines were thoroughly dry, different values of wash were brushed over the drawing. Iron gall ink washes are quite pale at first, but they darken considerably upon exposure to light, so I had to make my dilutions much weaker than I would have expected. Iron gall ink remains water-soluble, and the initial line work was somewhat blurred by the washes. In a final step, important contours were reinforced with the pen and undiluted ink.

@@renskee.jellema8697 thanks for that information! The pouncing method was used to transfer cartoons (full sized sketches) onto walls for fresco, but I was unaware that it was also used to reproduce drawings. I’ve never used iron gall ink. It sounds like the darkening effect would make it very difficult to work with in washes. I’m surprised to hear you say that it remains water soluble since most texts I’ve read say it’s waterproof. Do washes of diluted iron gall reactivate the dried ink? If so, perhaps the washes were done with a different ink, avoiding the issue of darkening and reactivation?

You’re welcome. This is as much about the pen as the paper, but I enjoy working in my Talens art creations sketchbook. The paper is smooth, but not slick, and resists feathering and bleed through.

That's great, Thank you! @@mkompan

There are many pen and ink drawing with indications of underdrawing and many without. There was no standard practice but must have depended on the objective. Accurate drawings necessitated underdrawings, looser sketches did not.

It was pretty difficult. I suggest starting by copying a few details for practice before doing the whole thing.

I made one on the feather: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/es6daZt23Z7XXaM.html I still need to do more research on bister ink before making a video on it.

@@mkompan cool thanks

Hmmm…I think about an hour each.

That’s very high praise, but thank you. I do think that my drawing is better than my copy, but the original drawing is levels and levels above anything I can do. Michelangelo smokes everyone, perhaps with the exception of Rubens and Durer. It’s a mistake to think that using historical materials will somehow improve your work. Sure, a little more transparency in the ink would have been nice, and quills are wonderful tools, but the deficiencies in my drawing are caused by technique and not materials.

@@mkompan Exactly why I said if you had the materials, your version would be better than his :D Michelangelo smokes everyone in overall talents (goodness was there any medium he wasn't a master in that he worked with?). But for strictly pen and ink, I'd take Wrightson/Virgil any day, those guys were unhealthy levels of good with that craft. One thing I always wondered about Old Masters. Life was tough in those days, there wasn't the internet or much of anything outside of art schools.. How did they have enough time to eek out a living while also making everyone else even in the modern day look like a joke? Now we have so many amenities, yet idk, I'd imagined the work an average artist today would be far more capable than any old master (in the same way any mathematics major today would make most mathematicians of centuries ago look silly). Can't make sense of that reality >_

@@Photo-Jay I believe I was making the exact opposite point about materials, but thank you. :) In all seriousness, I spent many years researching and recreating old master methods when I was younger, and can confidently say that most of the art materials available today are miles better than what was used in the past. If you think about, it's no surprise that the old master's were generally better. Many artists started their training at 9 years old, when they were apprenticed to a master. From that point on they did nothing other than make art. Most artists today take their first drawing classes in their teens, and don't get to pursue art seriously until art school. Also, let's not forget that Michelangelo studied under Ghirlandaio, who likely studied under some very good Florentine masters, and that there was an unbroken line of evolving knowledge being passed down for several generations. Such continuity of craft was completely lost in the 20th century and we're still in the process of recovering it.

@@mkompan I find it interesting to think about that they were nurtured from such a young age to pursue art. You think that modern day stigma still existed back then? You know the thing when parents or friends hear someone wants to be an artist and think they should instead try to be a lawyer because it's "risky" or "you won't be able to make a living"?

I remember reading somewhere that Michelangelo's father initially had some reservations, but they came from an impoverished banking family, so there was a concern over the lowering of social status. In many cases artists came families of skilled tradespeople such as goldsmiths, or other relatively humble middle class occupations, so the study of painting (which was considered a respectable skilled trade) was probably viewed as a lateral move. Keep in mind, there where way more opportunities to make a living as an artist in those days, and it wasn't as risky as it is now. Nowadays most of us have to scrape together what they can by posting dumb videos on KZfaq. :)

Thank you! Much appreciated.

Thank you!