Sometimes I find the nibs of fine-liners a little ‘scratchy’ on the tooth of rougher paper. So I ordered myself some Uni-ball Eye gel rollerball pens hoping the glide may be better.
They’re lovely pens, but wrong choice for the scene I was drawing — Llyn Mymbyr from my 40th birthday trip to Snowdonia. These pens have a 0.5 nib and the paper in my Royal Langnickel sketchbook is a little too absorbent, so the sketch came out a little ‘heavy’ for what should have been quite a delicate scene. I like the chunkiness of the line in the foreground, but it doesn’t work for the details of the distant shoreline at all.
Still, that’s what my daily art practice is all about — testing and exploration. I feel like I’m really getting to know my materials and each sketch allows me to make small correctional choices for the next one.
