Using Undertones with Colored Pencils

Hello, all!

Julie here, and I've put together a new video tutorial for you about using undertones with colored pencils on the Lovely Lavender stamp set.

(Can't see the embedded video? You'll find it right here on our website.)

Here are the steps I used for those of you who would like some step-by-step visuals to print out.

I’ve stamped my image on mixed media paper with permanent, quick drying ink, and I’m going to start with a light blue undertone to build the desired color. My plan with this is to make it sort of a blue-lavender color, like the lavender flowers in my mom’s front yard.

I’m going to get started with small, light circles, and I’m sticking to the bottoms of each of these little pips, so that my shadows are sort of blue-tinted. I’m going to try and keep the circles pretty light, and to stay inside the lines, as usual.

And of course I’ll do that for the whole thing, and end up with blue in all the little nooks and crannies of the pips. The next color is going to be Lilac, and it’s going to go in the tops of the pips, and fade into the blue a bit.

Next I’ll go in with a darker purple and go over the blue here. It’s going to turn a sort of blue-lavender color. I’m trying to keep my circles pretty light, so that when I come back in a couple of steps with my colorless blender, I’ll still be able to mix the colors a little bit.

Next I put little bits of white at the top of each pip to be a highlight. This also tends to blend the lilac out a bit and makes it a little bit smoother.

Now I’m going to use my colorless blender to do the same sort of blending thing to the bottoms of the pips. As I said earlier, this will blend the colors as well as smoothing it out a bit. It’ll make that blue undertone stand out a little bit more. And as I’m doing this, if I decide that I want it to be a little bit darker or whatever, I can go back in with the Parma Violet and Light Cerulean Blue and intensify that color combination a little bit.

Next I'll start in on the stems and leaves. I’m going to start with Spring Green, with a light layer on pretty much everything that’s going to be green. On the stems, I’m just going to do light straight strokes ‘cause getting little circles in that tiny area is pretty difficult.