Coloring Hair with Copics – Color Wednesday #44 (TEW Lucy Loo Bookaholic)
Happy Wednesday, everyone!
Last week I got a Facebook message from artist Unky inviting me to check out her Etsy shop The East Wind, where she sells digital images. Curious, I clicked over and fell in love and just had to color one particular image for today’s Color Wednesday video! She generously sent over the digital image for me to try out. Thanks, Unky! I’m totally a hair person when it comes to coloring (I LOVE to color hair!), so these images are right up my alley.
The image I fell in love with is Lucy Loo Bookaholic. The tall stacked tresses with the cat on top caught my eye! I just knew I had to color the kitty like Mannie! LOL!
The East Wind’s Larger Digital Images
One of the great things about The East Wind images is that they are nice and big. This image was actually large enough to fill an entire 8.5 x 11 piece of cardstock, but I sized it down on my computer before printing so that it could fit on a card. Because the files are generous enough to fill a larger area, I could see these being great images for practicing your Copic coloring. I would call this situation “Hair Heaven”! Smaller areas are generally harder to color, so having the image larger would be helpful. I’ve yet to print this image out at a larger scale, but I really want to do that soon. :)
Coloring Hair
The East Wind’s images are great for learning how to color hair in particular because Unky has included detail lines on the hair. You can use these lines as cues for how to shade the hair while coloring. Be sure to watch the video below for more tips on coloring hair with Copics.
Printing Digital Images for Copic Coloring
I open digital files in Adobe Illustrator to print them. You can also open the images in Microsoft Word or any other word processing program and print them from there. If you’re unsure of placement on the page, I suggest printing it out on regular inexpensive computer paper to see if it’s in the right spot. If all looks well, go ahead and put your nice cardstock in the printer and print again. If not, move the image on the screen and then print another test.
Every person’s printer is a little bit different, so I can only speak for the one I use, but I haven’t had any problems printing out digital images for coloring with Copics. I have an older Epson printer that uses Epson Claria inks. Sadly, they don’t sell the same printer anymore, but here’s an updated printer that I suspect would also work since it also uses Claria inks.
My little Epson workhorse handles the thicker Simon Says Stamp 120lb Ultra Thick Cardstock extremely well and I haven’t had any issues. On the other hand, I also have an inexpensive Brother laser printer that doesn’t pick up thicker cardstock (it just sits in the paper tray and gives me a “out of paper” error–boo!). It also doesn’t print as nicely as the Epson. So while I print out a lot of text using the Brother printer, I’ll keep printing images for coloring with the Epson printer.
Printed Images Smearing with Copics?
If you’re having issues with your printed images smearing with Copics, I would suggest letting it dry overnight. Maybe even a couple days. I’ve heard that though printouts from inkjet printers might feel dry to the touch, it’s not completely dry. And if you let it sit for a long time, the ink will settle and you’ll be able to use Copics with it. You could also heat with a heat tool as well. Try those suggestions and see what happens. :)
Anyhow, I hope you enjoy today’s video! :)
Watch video below | Watch at YouTube
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