Sepia colours with Copics, by Fran

Hello, it's Fran here. It's been tough trying to think up of things I can show you when I'm surrounded by uber talented group of ladies on the DT. So, after much head scratching thought I'd do what I love most . . which is colouring!
Well I know Copic tutorials are everywhere but it's always interesting to see how everyone colours I think, and for mine I thought I'd do a specific colour palette and show you how I achieve a sepia coloured look - great for vintage style cards. So here we go . . .

Materials:

• smooth coloured cardstock of your preference, for this I have used a cream cardstock (I use a 200gsm smooth coated card from Rymans stationers which comes in White and Ivory cream colour. I find it's smooth enough and doesn't bleed and it's readily available to me in the UK, so is my card of choice. Plus it's inexpensive which is a bonus)
• Memento ink 'Rich Cocoa'
• Copic colours E40, E43, E44, E47, E49 (E02 optional)
• Stamp of your choice (I've used 'Melinda Christmas Angel') plus all your other bits needed to make up your card

Colouring:
I've put together slideshow of how I've coloured her. I've tried to take a photo after each bit and listed the colour I used. Basically the way I colour is pretty much always the same;

• I imagine the light source to be coming down from top right hand corner


• take small sections (always do my face/skin bits first) at a time


• work out where the darkest bits are and colour using my lightest shade (kind of a marker so that if it doesn't look right it doesn't matter). Usually bits to the left/under the light or if it's behind/below something. Conversely, bits at the right/top, sticking out like nose, or curved bits of head will be the lightest.


• Will then move to my darker shade and recolour the bits I have just done then go back to my light shade to colour all of the area and soften/blend the darker bits as I go.
  If certain areas need darker shading I will either use the same dark shade again or a shade darker and repeat process of laying down bit of dark and then blending out with the lighter shade. How much 'blending' will depend how much shading I want to achieve and how 'smooth' I want it to look. I'm not one to blend out all lines as I think it gives more texture/depth if you leave some visible breaks in the shading or even white areas for the lightest bits.


• to minimise lines try light feather stokes where you lift nib off the page right at the end of your stroke as you colour - all in the fingers/wrist and with practice!

Right enough waffle, here's the slideshow, hopefully you can see what I mean;

then to finish:I then cut out image with 'labels 8' nesties, and with the die still on, I sponged around the image with distress inks 'antique linen' and tiny bit of 'weatherd wood' (to tie in with my background dp) and to make it a bit more 'old' looking, like so (yes, I tear out pages from old phone book to line my work when I ink etc then it goes in the recycle bin and I use cheap make up sponges for sponging - they feel same as cut n dry foam ;)) -
I've then matted image onto bit of kraft card (by cutting around the die - I run this through my cuttlebug as if I was embossing it which leaves nice impression for me to cut around & saves me tracing round it with pencil). Add some papers from MME christmas stack, bit of ribbon, lace, roses & embellisments, touch of faux stitching and voila, my finished sepia coloured christmas card (click on photo for closer view) Hope it's been useful. Any questions/feedback or requests for future welcome - just leave a comment. Thanks for visiting.