Neuland Workshop

This spread was created after my workshop with Carrie Imai. I've never been too fond of the Neuland hand, but I liked the variations that she showed us--some of which are shown here. The word "Neuland" was written with a 5 mm Zig calligraphy marker and Carrie's name was done with a 3.5 mm Marvy, then outlined with a very finetip pen, and embellished with interior lines in Stardust Gelly Rolls (which hardly show in this scan).

We used Automatic pens in the workshop. I had never understood why they are called that. There's nothing automatic about them, except the fact that you don't have to pluck a goose and sharpen your quill knife before using one. I went to their website http://www.automaticpens.co.uk/newindex.asp and discovered the answer. My name and "Catch The Rhythm" were written with a No. 4 Automatic (which is almost 8 mm wide) and then glued to the pages. There are two reasons why I used markers at the top of the page. The primary reason is that I didn't have an Automatic pen that would write that small, and the second reason is that I just wanted to write without messing with gouache. I didn't use a Pilot Parallel pen because I found out the hard way on another page that the ink in those cartridges, when used on top of acrylic paint, will easily smear and transfer to the opposite page when the journal is shut. Speaking of acrylic paint, the background for this spread was Americana "Calypso Blue" and FolkArt "Buttercup."