I just stopped by Japan and bought about 300 copic markers. I bought a hand full of these markers in the us for the not so cheap price of 7.99 per marker. My limited color palette made completing a full drawing rather impossible. Now that I have the whole set I'm going to make a real attempt to master this medium.
Here is my sister a fellow steemian and world traveler. This image was inspired by the waters on the coast of Ito, Japan.
Along with the style of art being anime-ish. I started with the figure of the charter first trying to apply what I knew about color pencils to markers.
I also learned copic markers can sometimes have a runny nose that's when the ink begins to run to freely and rapidly deposits the marker fluid. But I noticed you can actually spot the "the runny noes" before it drips preventing messy accidents like the ones that happen on the leg and shoe. (Btw: I totally just made up the copic marker condition named "runny nose". But the symptom is real.") I then messed around with the water playing with the aqua colors. But I don't just pick colors and force them to match.(Does that ever work with any medium? Oh wait, yeah it does, with digital.). I place a series of color swatches next to each other to make sure they work well together.
It is worth mentioning copic has already crafted their markers with a built in color system. The tops of the markers (in the sketch series) has a letter and numbers on them that help you find the right color rapidly. The letters will tell you the hue/chroma. B= Blue, BG = Blue Green, V= Violet. The first number will determine the saturation 1-9, one being more saturated and 9 being more transparent. The second digit will show you the darkness of the color.
That's right this jumbled mess of markets has an elaborate and organized system for you the artist. Example: So a B23, B24, and B28 go to a bar... (No). Because B24 is closer in numeric value to B23 then it will harmonize/ blend better than the B28.
So your brain will begin to see these codes as an easy way of picking out midtones, shadows and highlights.