Exercise 2.4 - Drawing with tea bags

This exercise consisted of gathering some materials which aren’t primarily made for drawing and painting and explore their potential in how they can be used and what marks they make.
Materials like a toothbrush, coffee, tea bags, anything likely to leave interesting marks on the paper.
I have chosen for this task a wet turmeric tea bag, some coffee mixed with water, a toothbrush and some kitchen paper and I got some surprising results. I could have tried more things but before I started this exercise I had already envisioned some possible outcomes with these chosen materials.

Below are the images with test marks of the chosen materials.

My first test where I used a damp turmeric tea bag and did some dabbing and dragging which produced a watercolour-like result. On the bottom test, I used a tortillion to create this sort of dream-like atmosphere.

Used coffee with a dash of water to dilute it and applied the solution to a toothbrush and tried to make interesting marks with it, I was happy with the results.

Tested black ink with a toothbrush and kitchen paper at the bottom of the page

After exploring the potential marks of the selected materials I put them in practice .
I got interested in the coffee and ink splatter to create the gravel leaving a speeding car or to illustrate blood splattered from a fight scene, put it has potential for so much more.
I also used the toothbrush with ink and dragged across the paper to help create a pavement in movement.

Reflection

I liked the effects that the materials I chose produced, the turmeric tea I was a bit apprehensive at first but changed my opinion after testing it, I liked the watercolour appearance it created together with the darker yellow clogs, I found it useful to build a low contrast illustration with really light tones, particularly useful to make a dense yellowy vegetation hence using the tortillion with a faint charcoal to create the sensation of being in a field.
This technique can be used to make natural landscape or an abstract background layered with a subject of any sort on top of it.

I also enjoyed the results with the coffee,  the watercolour effect, the splattering and dragging with toothbrush created some interesting effects.

The last experiment with the toothbrush and kitchen paper with ink gave , in my opinion, the best results, it adds so much energy to the illustrations if you’re trying to create a dynamic scene.
The splattering and dragging effects is a technique which I’ll add to my “drawing toolbox”, very useful in creating sequential art .


During the experiments with unusual materials, I visualised potential drawings that I could make with these techniques applied which I guess is a symptom of how useful I found this exercise.

Of the selected materials however, I would change the kitchen paper and use a ragged cloth or something more rough and grainy instead, I’ve seen some comic book artists use this technique when illustrating pinups, it adds more depth to the backgrounds which is quite useful.