The subject for today’s post is squiggly strokes with colored pencils.
This post is part of an ongoing series of the basic and specialty strokes I use in my art. I’ve already described the basic strokes I use for almost every piece (directional, and hatching and crosshatching), and one of the specialty strokes (stippling).
Squiggly strokes are another specialty stroke. Like stippling, I use squiggly strokes primarily for landscapes. They are perfect for drawing foliage but are not very useful for animals. At least I haven’t yet found a way to make use of them for drawing animals.
Squiggly Strokes and How They Came About
Before I describe squiggly strokes, I need to share a little background.
I didn’t set out to define a new type of stroke, nor did I read about or see another artist using this stroke. Instead, it came about naturally as I sketched trees for various landscape projects. You can see how I used squiggly strokes in the landscape sketch below.
I also used other strokes, but you can clearly see squiggly strokes in the places where there is no shading in the trees.
What are Squiggly Strokes?
Squiggly strokes are just what they sound like. Continuous marks that “squiggle” around on the paper. They’re not really a layering stroke, though you could use them that way if you wanted to.
(That gives me an idea for an ACEO. Layers of nothing but squiggly strokes in different colors to fill up the paper. Hmmm.)
How to Make Squiggly Strokes with Colored Pencils
Making squiggly strokes is very easy. Put your pencil tip on the paper and move it around randomly. Use light pressure. For fine lines with crisp edges, use a sharp pencil. For slightly thicker lines with softer edges, use a dull pencil (or even a blunt pencil)
Adjusting the way you hold your pencil can also change the way the strokes look. Hold your pencil in a more horizontal position to make thicker marks, or in a vertical position for finer lines.
Squiggly strokes work with any pencil on any paper, but if you draw on Pastelmat or any textured paper, you will need to sharpen your pencil frequently to maintain the crisp lines.
Since I do a lot of sketching on Stonehenge and similar papers, that’s the type of paper I most often use squiggly strokes on. But I have also had good success using squiggly strokes on Pastelmat and other highly textured papers.
The same applies to the type of pencils. Soft, waxy pencils like Prismacolor and harder pencils like Faber-Castell Polychromos are all capable of making squiggly strokes. Now you may find that the combination of pencil and paper makes a big difference, but you can basically use any pencil on any paper.
You can also use any pressure, but will usually get the best results with medium pressure or lighter. That’s because the more pressure you put on the pencil, the more difficult it can be to get the random movements necessary for making squiggly strokes.
When to Use Squiggly Strokes
I use this stroke mostly for sketching in a landscape at the beginning of a drawing. Here’s a sample showing how I used the squiggly stroke to outline a group of low-growing trees. As you can see, it’s the perfect stroke for this. Just a few squiggly lines and you have bushes and trees!
But it’s also useful for adding details and creating edges near the finish of a drawing.
Squiggly strokes are also good for adding highlights to foliage. I frequently “edge” the sunny side of trees with a light color, then work around and into that color with darker colors. It’s important to break up the squiggly line, so it doesn’t look too artificial.
Here’s an example of using squiggly strokes for highlights. The best place to see the squiggly stroke is in the shadow near the right side of this group of bushes. I squiggled a light green over the shadows to create the appearance of a branch emerging from the shadow. I also used squiggly strokes to add sunlit foliage in front of shadows.
But there are also other squiggly strokes throughout this group of bushes. Most of them are well camouflaged by other strokes. I did that to make sure the bushes looked like bushes.
It also helps to mix colors to make your strokes look more natural, especially in a landscape.
Squiggly Strokes and Colored Pencils: The Bottom Line
As I mentioned above, I don’t use the squiggly stroke for anything but landscapes, but I don’t use it all the time for those. When I do use this stroke, it’s either for the initial sketch-in or for adding highlights.
But it is a good stroke for adding details that don’t look so “planned” and for creating natural looking landscape textures.
You may find squiggly strokes useful, too. And if you find a way to use them in drawing something other than landscapes, let me know! I’d love to see it!
By the way, remember that idea I had earlier in the post? Here’s the result of my “squiggly stroke” abstract. It turned into more of a landscape than I planned, but it was still fun.
What do you think?
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