WORKING WITH WAXY PAPER

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These are marker portraits done on a waxy surface, such as tracing paper. The benefit of this technique is that the waxy texture keeps the ink wet for longer, allowing you to smear it around like paint. And if you make a mistake, all you need to do is to re-wet the ink, and it comes right off!

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Unlike the traditional marker portraits, where you can see the streaks of the pen, this method gives you a smooth painted look, even with the streakiest of markers like Faber-Castell. 

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After scanning the piece, the texture of the tracing paper can be edited out by increasing the brightness in Photoshop (like in the Ben Goldacre drawing below), but I often keep it in, as I think the texture of the background gives it a unique quality, like in the Lucie Green drawing to the left.