Artist Media: felt-tip markers, watercolor, and gouache

Felt-tip markers are a good medium to use for sketching as well as finished renderings for presentations, graphic design, advertising, and package design. Felt tip markers are water or solvent based. Water-based markers are generally non-toxic. Permanent markers are solvent-based and use xylene, ethyl alcohol, propyl alcohol, or methyl isobutyl ketone as a vehicle. Avoid using permanent markers that contain xylene, as they can cause dizziness, headaches, and nausea. The fumes from methyl isobutyl ketone markers are also very irritating to many people. Ethyl alcohol and propyl alcohol-based permanent markers are much less toxic, although the vapors may cause mild eye or respiratory irritation. All markers should be used in areas with good ventilation.

Layout bond is a good paper to use with felt tip markers. Coated papers do not absorb ink as well and a certain amount of color depth is lost. When using felt-tip markers, the color bleeds a bit on the paper. To control this, color a hair thickness within your line, so that when the color runs, it’s within the area you want. Save your markers they dry out, they are great for blending or filling in small spaces. When coloring an area black, many design students opt to use a charcoal gray color, then come back with a black pencil to fill in any details, such as lines or seams. The use of charcoal gray does not lend itself to a rich looking black. I recommend using a black marker to color in and then going back with black gouache paint and a brush and filling in the details. The black gouache stands out very well against the black marker ink and the black in general looks very rich. This brings us to water-based paints.

Water-based paints include acrylic, watercolor, gouache, casein, and tempera. I will talk about watercolor and gouache paints, which are quite similar. They are mainly made up of a gum, water, preservatives and pigments. They may also contain glycerin, syrup, and other non-toxic ingredients. Watercolor is more transparent, especially when diluted with water, gouache contains calcareous calcium carbonate which makes it opaque. Both paint mediums are easy to clean up with water, fast drying and versatile.

Gouache’s opacity makes it a very good medium for painting on colored papers. The pigments in these paints give rich, concentrated colors and can be mixed to give a broad spectrum. Pigments that are already mixed into paints are generally safe, unlike mixing your own powdered pigment where they can be inhaled. The main danger of pigments is accidentally ingesting the pigment. Some pigments that are toxic include compounds of cadmium, cobalt, lead, manganese, and mercury. The pigments chrome yellow, zinc yellow, strontium yellow, and cadmium are some examples of pigments that can cause lung cancer. As a precaution, do not eat or drink while using paints, wash your hands afterwards, including under your fingernails.