With the availability and popularity of the tablet and digital inking, it's a bit rare to find people who still do inking with good old pen and ink. Despite how simple digital inking can be, there are unique qualities that can only be achieved while traditional inking. After all, when you dip your pen nib into an ink container, you don't know how much is exactly on there, or when it will run out, or when it might decide to be bad to you and leave you with an ugly-looking ink blot.
Still, that's really all part of the charm of traditional inking!

Anyone else here do their inking traditionally? How many use ball-point or roller-ball or calligraphy pens? How many use something old-fashioned like an ink nib or a fountain pen? If you've traditionally inked before, but prefer digital inking, why is that?

Personally I use a special nib known as the "Cheryl Nib" (my art teacher's name, that's mostly why it's special) which you put on a black holder of sorts, and regular Higgins brand black ink. Sometimes when I am a bit lazier (so not for comics, but for regular line art) I use either a .3 or a .8 Micron calligraphy pen. For lettering, I've been using a roller-ball pen, .7 thickness I think.

I am also predominately a traditional media artist. Everything I do is hand sketched, hand inked and in most cases hand colored as well. However, I do occassionally play with my tablet, I find it sits and collects dust more then its used.

As for the types of pens I use, I definitely favor copic multiliners and brush liners as I can use them with multiple mediums without smudging or bleeding. I used to use microns, but I dislike the nibs. Copic also has the smallest avaliable nib (and I am a stickler for detail, so I NEED to have the smallest). Prismacolor and most other brands sell a smallest nib of .05, but copic sells one lower at .03. I love to ink and use markers, inks and watercolors in much of my work if its not a pencil illustration.

I've never been able to get used to inking with my tablet, so I use Prismacolour pens as well as a couple calligraphy pens and a pen that works sort of like a brush, depending on what kind of effect I want.

I am not really in an "inking" phase right now - I'm using boosted pencil in Photoshop, corrected digitally. But one of my projects (currently on hold) is a combination of #4 watercolor brush with Higgins "Black Magic" and a #102 steel crowquill. That one I plan to do traditionally throughout. But also, I think that the proper paper is really important too - when I plan to ink with steel pens I use 500# full cotton rag plate-finish 3-ply bristol, which I buy in sheets and cut down myself with a board shear. But that's really expensive, so I consider that kind of drawing my "art luxury" which I treat myself to on occasion.

Truth is, if you don't have a good grip on the fundamentals, a tablet won't do you any more good than the brush itself will. But it does have the benefit of being very fast and efficient. Until the hard drive crashes. I'm experimenting with my new tablet right now and I have to say it's a very useful tool, but I still feel drawn to traditional media, "just because."

--M

Although I ink and color my final pieces traditionally, the final results are often too bright for what I want to aim for in my comic. I'm going to do everything with either ink for pencil, leaning towards penciling. Now I have two favorite pens in the whole wide world. First off, I'm a ball-point pen fan. I love how you can still get value in much the same way you can a pencil—by pressure. Needless to say, my favorite pair of pens are BIC's crystal pens and Steadtler's ball-point pen which is an astonishing 0.2 mm thick. And the ink runs pretty darn smoothly, I might add.

I'm leaning towards pencils, though. I really like the motion I can get out of penciling. I'm still experimenting whit it, of course.

As far as coloring goes, I'm definitely going digital under the penciling or inking. I'm also adding texture so that the roughness of the penciling or inking doesn't clash with the colors.

I mostly ink traditionally. I only ink specific projects digitally and it's not nearly as satisfying as working on paper. I use ink pens (FaberCastell Ecco pigment, they're delightfully moist, not hard like other ink pens) and occasionally a brush pen, but I'm starting to miss using a good old brush and ink bottle so I'm about to begin experimenting with that again. The brush pen has too pointed a tip, I'll be more comfortable with a fine but rounded tip.
When I started out I used the dip-pen, but I don't know if I'll dare try it again, I caused quite a few disasters with it at the time

I completely agree, there is something theraputic about working on paper with tangible mediums. I love it.

As for dip-pens, I can completely agree. I had trouble with them when I first started playing with them, but I found out that you really need to work the tip enough and when its more flexible it works MUCH better.

Right now I'm working on a comic that is completely digital, but otherwise I use pens, brushpens and brushes. The only thing I barely ever use is a nib pen. But that's only because I need to get a good, new one and don't really have the time for it, sadly.
Mostly I use brushpens and a some Micron pens for smaller detail when working traditionally. I like to fill in blacks with a brush (though many times I just fill them up in Photoshop). Every now and then I miss touching real materials and tools so I draw or paint something outside the computer. I am not a tablet enthusiastic, it's just a practical tool as far as I'm concerned. I don't prefer digital ink over traditional methods - quite the opposite. Really, once I'm done with my current project I vow to never ink digitally again! Seriously. I have to see this through, but once it's over - goodbye digital inking! I'd like to get back to using only a brush. Oh yeah... I'd buy some nice brushes.... mmmmmm.... it's gonna be great.

Ah it's so cool to hear how everyone does traditional inking in their own way! And that so many do!

I should probably give dip-pens a second chance But I'll have to shop for good ones next time I'm in Europe, doubt we have a lot of variety here. I started working with brush again yesterday and it's better than I expected after all these years with ink pens. Next step: attempt a full page!

I still have some dot tattoos on my fingers because of sharp crow quill pens. Nothings is more exciting than reaching for a pen and getting a tattoo at the same time.



Even so, his is still my favorite inking tool. Not saying I'm any good at it though. In fact, I really suck at inking.

My comic is going to be digitally inked, though I vastly prefer traditional inks. This project is getting the digital treatment mostly because it's an area I need to work on, and digital inking allows me to do a panel here for 10 minutes before work, a panel there, etc. Less setup, and I don't need to worry about getting on a roll and then running out of decent paper.

I can write odes about the virtues of my Hunt 102 nib, though, man I love that thing. Such line variation! It is a thing of beauty. I'm aiming to get better at brush inking too.

I have a lot of respect for people who can ink traditionally, because I have no talent or patience for it (the same reason I have respect for people who can do watercolor). It's not for lack of trying either, every few months I get inspired to try and end up with a grotesque monstrosity.

I used refined versions of my sketches, which I still have to correct digitally sometimes. Because I'm that pro.

I typically use the Microns to ink, but that's because my inking is rarely ever more than simply re-tracing my pencil lines and I don't need anything fancy to do that. :/ I know full well that inking is supposed to add to the art rather than simply trace over it, but I've never been able to find an inking style that has worked for me so I tend to end up with what I call "coloring book lines". I also have crowquill nibs, Higgins black ink, and a fancy Rapidograph that I used once and decided it was too much work to keep clean and refill.

I would say that my initial drawing depends a lot on what the final artwork is going to be rendered in. For instance, I'll draw slightly differently for a pencil drawing as compared to ink work or even a full painting. Each medium has slightly different qualities so I try to allow for that when I start a piece.

For my ink work (since that's what we're talking about) I find I don't draw as tightly. And the line work I do is done mainly to indicate where I'm going to put ink. As soon as I realized that I wasn't "tracing" my pencil drawing and was instead creating something different that I couldn't get with just pencils, my ink work really improved.

I love ink drawing becuase of the different textures and marks that you can make. I'll use anything that will make a mark on the page - but mainly a beat up old quill that I've had for about 10 years and has been used on every kind of surface you can imagine, some brushes that are definitely "well used," disposable rapidograph pens and an old tooth brush for splattering ink. Oh and white paint is a must too!

To be honest, what a bunch of you are doing with "digital inking" I find amazing. My pencil work isn't that precise - which may explain why I like inking.

Traditional inking is a tough skill to master. I used to ink all my work about 10-11 years ago, and after dumping a bottle of ink on my carpet, I quit.

Seriously.

I was fed up and had ruined a cityscape about 5 times before I was introduced to my first WACOM tablet. It took me a year to get used to the motions, but I haven't looked back since. In fact, I don't think I've gone and drawn anything other than thumbnails or prelim sketches with graphite. Everything is digital now - I'm spoiled by the CTRL Z.

You can't undo ink blobs. It takes longer to erase and redraw - something I don't have the patience for anymore.

@ Drezz - As I mentioned in my earlier post, working like that (on just a Wacom) is pretty cool to me. That being said, what I find most interesting about traditional inking is the parts you can't control. There is not Ctrl Z to undo unless you paint it out with white paint (which I do all the time). I try to embrace the blobs and drips and brush strokes that I didn't plan. It's brought a real freshness to how I approach inking. Don't get me wrong, there are times when I think "Oh, man! I just *bleeped* this up!" But for the most part, I've actually learned how to plan things like splattered ink and drips, work with stuff that wasn't quite what I intended, or paint it out and redo it. I guess it all comes down to personal preference, but for me, inking itself is just a different way to produce a drawing and something that I really like the results of.

I don't know if anyone's tried something like this before, but I spent a couple of years doing nothing but ink drawing in my sketchbook with just a pen on paper. No erasing. It really made my drawing better and made me think about what lines I was putting down on paper and how ones I would normally erase were actually more interesting a lot times. Try it out. It takes some practise, but it was well worth it.

That's pretty much how I passed the time throughout high school. And I still sketch like that. It can be very loose or very tight, either way there's no erasing. I actually have an erasable pen and I just now remembered I have it! I don't use it at all.

I really enjoy working with a standard ballpoint pen and sketching. The rough look works well, and there's no worries of graphite smudges (which I can't stand!)

I actually developed many characters for my stories using that technique. I find that the gel based ink from ballpoints lends itself well to manipulating your line weights if you build up enough ink on the paper.

Yes! I do all my sketching in ballpoint pen, having abandoned pencils years ago! I do my inking on tracing paper so what I use for the "pencils" doesn't matter