How To Ink Drawings

Hello everyone, today we are going to examine a fundamental phase of drawing: inking. This phase is usually crucial in the creation of a drawing, so we will see together what it is for, what materials are needed and, most importantly, how to do it?

Prepare your pencils, paper or tablet and most importantly, your creativity! Let's go!

WHAT IS INKING?

Inking, as the name suggests, involves inking your drawing by tracing the outlines and some texture lines. Inking provides a cleaner and more precise result than sketching.

The technique of inking dates back to the Middle Ages, when scribes used inks to create illuminations and outlines of illustrations to make them clearer.

Over time, this technique has become more popular and has mainly been used in the fields of comics, graphic novels, and manga.

Today, inking is primarily known as line-art, literally "art of the line".

Inking is also widely used in coloured illustrations to give definition to the drawing. This often makes it possible, unlike techniques such as painting, to work with simple colour layers and thus simplify this stage while maintaining a harmonious result.

There isn't just one type of inking, although the techniques are similar, the artist's graphic touch is clearly visible in their way of inking as you can see in the examples below. You are also free to experiment to find the inking style that you like the most and that best suits your drawings.

THE MATERIAL

AUXILIARY TOOLS

Before exploring the different inking methods, here are some very useful tools for inking in traditional drawing:

- A kneaded eraser, which will help you soften the lines of your drawing;
- A classic eraser, which allows you to erase cleanly after inking;
- A light tablet is the ideal tool for quality inking; it allows you to work on a fresh sheet of paper, thus without roughness from various erasures or pencil marks. Furthermore, if you make a mistake, you always have the option of starting over without damaging the drawing.

MARKERS

Markers are perhaps THE most common and well-known inking medium. They come in various sizes of nibs, from fine to thick, and with different types of ink (alcohol, Indian ink, etc.). Markers have several advantages: they are generally inexpensive, the ink is not shiny and covers well, they do not smudge when erasing, and the wide variety of nibs allows them to adapt to all types of inking, from the finest to the thickest.

Markers are often recommended for beginners because they are very easy to handle and allow for very precise inking without too much difficulty.

COLOURED MARKERS

Coloured markers are somewhat less common and yet they offer exactly the same benefits as classic markers with one exception: it is more difficult to find different tip sizes, especially thick tips.

Coloured markers allow a generally softer inking, ideal for colouring, for example. For best results, it is best to use colours that are harmonious with each of the different shades of the design. The result is often very beautiful, but also requires more working time during the inking process.

THE PEN

The pen is one of the best known inking tools and is mainly used by manga artists. There are two main categories: fountain pens, with integrated ink in the form of cartridges, and dip pens with separate ink pots. There are numerous shapes of nibs to suit all desired strokes and a wide variety of inks. The dip pen, although more expensive to purchase, proves more economical in the long run and also allows for a variety of ink types and colours.

The pen is more technical to handle than the pencil, yet it is a highly valued inking tool due to the precision of the inking and the quality of the rendering. However, attention must be paid to several points: Ink drops can easily smudge the drawing by falling off, and the ink takes a while to dry and can therefore smudge if you run your hand over it or erase it.

GO DIGITAL

Digital is undoubtedly the easiest way to ink: you can find a large number of brushes that will allow you to achieve the appearance you want. It's very easy to manage the pressure, and thus the fineness or thickness of the line, and you can very easily colour your line-art.

Digital inking has other important advantages: one can easily erase lines one does not like, the zoom tool makes it easier to work on details and one can play with layers to ink the design, which is much quicker and easier than erasing manually or using a light table.

 

THE FULL STROKES AND THIN STROKES

Now we can get to the heart of the matter! Variations in line thickness during inking are called thickening and thinning. These variations allow you to play with the dynamics of the drawing, resulting in a more interesting and voluminous inking.

Thicks (the thickest part) are generally used to emphasize a shadow or thick area, while thins (the thinnest part), conversely, emphasize a light or thin area.

Thicks and thins are undoubtedly one of the most technical aspects of inking as they require good dexterity and proper management of pressure and/or pencil curvature.

If you have difficulty creating them, I suggest you practise by drawing abstract shapes (like the one on the left) in which you vary the line thickness as smoothly as possible.

As you can see in the examples below, there is not just one way to use thick and thin lines or a specific stroke thickness for each. Some (like the middle drawing) choose to create the outer borders in thick lines and the inner details in thin lines, while others (like the drawing on the right) use thick lines to suggest shadow and thin lines to suggest light.

So it's up to you to experiment to find the way that you like the most.

THE LINE

To achieve successful inking, it is essential to have well-done lines; otherwise, the inking may lose quality or look clumsy.

So you must pay attention to the quality of your line: 

- Avoid blurred lines that give a sketchy appearance and thus an impression of unfinished work;
- Pay attention to irregularities and spots, the line must be smooth;
- Be careful not to make unintended connections between two of your features, as this risks losing volume and coherence;
- Try to keep the line as smooth and continuous as possible.

The quality of the line can easily be improved with a little work and time. Here is an exercise that I recommend doing regularly if you want to improve your line:

- Start by placing random dots;
- Connect these points with the straightest possible lines. You can make the exercise more challenging by varying the thickness of your lines;
- Once you have mastered straight lines, you can practice with curves and also vary the thickness to make the exercise more challenging.

This exercise is quite quick and will help you increase your dexterity, however the best way to improve is to practise inking your own drawings.

 

SHADING THE INKING

In comics, graphic novels, and manga, it is common to see shaded inking to add a bit more dimension to the drawing. This is an optional step, but let’s go over some basics together.

The difficulty in shading an inking consists in varying the tones to add depth without making the drawing too heavy. To achieve this, it is necessary to trick our eye by playing with rhythms of lines or dots that will give us the illusion, depending on their density, of different shades of grey.

There are many ways to create these illusions, but the most common ones are:

1 - Lines;
2 - Hatching;
3 - Dots.

These techniques are ideal because they are quite easy to work with, you can use just one or combine them to add more dimension. However, care must be taken that this remains a detail in the inking, to preserve the finesse and basic depth.

It is also important to ensure consistency between the volume of the drawing and the way lines and shading points are used. Always draw them in the direction of the volume of the object to enhance its movement and volume.

Below are some examples of inking with shading. As you can see, the shading adds a lot of details and depth to the inking and gives the impression of a finished drawing.

INKING YOUR DRAWING STEP BY STEP

Now that we have gone through all the theory, I suggest we illustrate it step by step.

- I finished the sketch; it has some imperfections, some details are crude and the lines are quite fuzzy, so I'll have to correct all that during my inking.

In traditional drawing, I blur my sketch with an eraser or use a lightbox to work on another sheet.
In digital drawing, I create a new layer and set the opacity of the sketch layer to 50%.

I start the inking with the head. It's a matter of preference, you can start with the part you want, but I find that starting with a point of interest is easier. I make sure to have a smooth line, pay attention to the junctions between the different strokes, and to the thick and thin lines.

I continue to do all the inking by drawing each of the tentacles one after the other. I like to focus on one area at a time.

If you are using a pen, I recommend always working from the farthest from your hand to the closest, to avoid smudging your ink.

As you can see, when I ink, I do not go perfectly over my lines, but I try to correct my drawing by refining the details.

I erase the lines of the sketch as cleanly as possible; with a light pad or digitally, you don't need this step.

I check if the inking is to my liking, adjust the line thickness if necessary and also add some simple shading lines.

And there it is, my inking is finished, just like this article! Inking is an important phase that takes time to master, however it is also quite a relaxing and often very enjoyable phase. I hope this article has given you some keys to success in inking and that you enjoyed it! 😊

Writer and Illustrator: Chloé Pouteau