Coffee lightfastness test

Here is the result of a light exposure test for drawing or painting with coffee. This ran from March 19 to May 8.

So far, the coffee is relatively lightfast.  I expected much more fading than is evident.

The experiment is continuing.

Goose Creek in Walnut Ink

A few Fridays ago, it was unseasonably warm, but the bugs and poison ivy weren't out yet.  I sat out and sketched by Goose creek, in the woods near my daughter's school, for an hour or two.  This was the result.  This was done mostly with a bamboo pen; some of it is my homemade soda can pen; and after I got home I worked in more details with a Hunt 101 nib.

detail:

White Barn Near Crestwood: black walnut ink drawing

I frequent a pen-and-ink discussion forum, and a talented artist there has been posting a series of drawings of barns that he has been doing.  They have been great to look at, and they helped push me to draw one myself.  I suppose I was already inclined, despite the long-ago warnings of one of my college professors (he had a list of things he advised us not to paint, because they were cliches: barns, ducks on ponds, sunsets, religious themes...there were probably more, but I forget what they were.)  My favorite buildings to draw are the ones that have a lot of "character"-- texture and wear.  So barns are attractive for that reason.

The subject was on my mind, and as a ran an errand through Crestwood a few weeks ago, I saw this barn.  I stopped and took some reference photos, and then did this drawing.  It's about 10 x 14 inches.

White Barn Near Crestwood

Details:

Falls of the Ohio Pen and Ink Detail

black walnut ink on paper

 This is another closeup of a pen and ink drawing. This section is about 4 x 4 inches. I really like the closeups because I like seeing the pen strokes and the patterns in the lines. That border between the representation of the scene, and the abstraction of the marks on paper, is what I find most exciting about any art medium.

Walnut ink house portrait,completed

I finished this house portrait a couple of days ago.  It was a challenge because of the darkness of the shadows on the dark house; building up layers of walnut ink to create large areas of deep value can be difficult because each new layer of crosshatching goes on less smoothly than the preceding layer.  Also, it was a struggle to make out the details in the source photographs.  At any rate, I am happy with the final result.

This is 11 x 15 1/2 inches on bristol paper.

walnut in house portrait work-in-progress

Scritch, scritch, scritch goes the pen nib

black walnut ink - work in progress

House portrait in black walnut ink, 11 x 15 inches

Details:

House portrait in walnut ink, 8 x 10 inches

Walnut ink house portrait

Black walnut ink house portrait

11 x 15 inches, finished yesterday.  This is a beautiful limestone block house overlooking the Ohio River.  There is a steep hill along the driveway, and the house is so broad across the front that I could not back up enough to get the entire house in one reference photo.  That made the layout a little more challenging, but the clean lines and right angles of the architecture helped.

7 x 10 black walnut ink house portrait

I completed this last night around 1 a.m.  I wondered at the time: What percentage of my commissions reach completion between midnight and 2:00 a.m.?  More than half, for sure, and maybe more like 90%.

This is a 100-year-old house in Pennsylvania that belonged to the grandmother of the person who commissined it.  She said four generations of her family grew up around this home.  The photo references I was provided were not of the greatest clarity, but I think I was able to make out enough between the two photos, plus a little help from Google Earth, to capture it pretty well.

House portrait in black walnut ink

A detail to show what is always my favorite part, the trees:

detail of house portrait

Another walnut ink house drawing

 This one is about 9 1/2 x 10 1/2 inches, on hot press watercolor paper.

Detail:

House portrait finished today

Black walnut ink on Bristol paper, 9 x 16 inches. 

 

Englarged for detail:

Gathering walnuts at lunch

Today I spent my lunch break gathering walnuts. Time to make more ink!

Black walnut ink house portrait

Just finished today during my lunch break. This is black walnut ink on paper, 8 x 11.25 inches.

Black walnut ink house portrait

and a closeup:

Black walnut ink house portrait - detail

House portrait in progress

I will finish this over the next few days--there is a deadline!

Walnut ink house portrait

This is one I finished a couple of weeks ago. It's 11 x 15 inches, walnut ink on Bristol board.

Black Walnut Ink House Portrait, 11 x 15 inches

This is on Bristol paper. I chose not to use any washes on this one; it's all cross-hatching.  I couldn't get the scan to go dark enough to pick up the shading on the sidewalk and pavement--you can barely see it, but it's a little darker on the actual drawing.

A couple of detail shots:

Pen & Ink house portrait, with detail

Here is another house portrait done with black walnut ink.  Unfortunately, I didn't have a chance to scan the drawing, and instead used my sub-par little camera. The detail shot turned out better because you can make out the texture of the line work.

This drawing is 11 x 15 inches on Bristol paper.

How to Make Black Walnut Ink (re-post)

The information below is a re-posting from my other blog, from nearly six years ago.  I decided it would be better suited to this blog, since this blog is explicitly about art and only art.

Homemade Black Walnut Ink (originally written 11-8-2007)

I recently began making my own black walnut ink for use in drawing. There are various recipes around the Internet, and all of them are similar.

This is a long process, but most of the time is devoted to waiting. Very little of it actually involves doing something.

The basic process for making black walnut ink is this: Get rotten black walnuts, husk and all. Boil the heck out of them. Strain the mess and use the brown juice for drawing or writing. That’s all there is to it, really, but I’m always game for elaborating…

Step 1. Find your walnuts. Black walnut trees are fairly plentiful here in Louisville, and that seems to be true for much of the eastern half of the U.S. In October, one can spot the green, leathery, round fruit (usually just a little smaller than tennis balls) on the ground or getting ready to fall. One doesn’t use them when they are green, however. Gather the blackest, rottenest, gunkiest ones you can find. If there aren’t any that are black and icky, gather the green ones. Gather the entire fruit. The small, hard shell with the nut in the center is a non-essential piece for the ink. What one needs is the leathery rind. Just pick up the whole thing.

Newly gathered walnuts. Eat 'em? Naw! Get back, squirrels! I'm an artist!


(Warning: Black, oozy walnuts will stain hands and clothing, so use some caution.)

Step 2. Put them in a plastic bag and let them rot. The green ones will turn black over a few days or weeks.

(Another warning: At any step in this process, one can set all these walnuts aside. They are already rotten; it’s not like putting one’s ink-making on hold for days or even weeks will ruin the batch. If you store the walnuts outside, however, critters will be drawn to them. Squirrels will tear open bags and gnaw on pots.)


I refer to the walnuts in disgusting terms, and they are pretty gross. They get slimy and moldy, and you’ll probably find all kinds of strange little bugs living in them. Don’t worry. It all cooks down to the same brown sludge. Except for those little pale brown beetle larvae. They stayed shiny and intact even after hours and hours of boiling. If the ick factor is too high, just remember that you must suffer for your art. So must those with whom you share your kitchen.

Step 3. After they are black, put them in a large pot for which you don’t have any great affection. I used a large aluminum pot that we use very infrequently. I was surprised that, after I was done, the pot cleaned up very well; other sources, however, say that their pots and pans can become discolored. Stainless steel or enamel-coated pots seem to be the general recommendation, but my aluminum one worked just great.

Cover the walnuts with water and let them soak for at least a day. The longer they soak, the better. My first batch soaked for a day, and my second batch soaked for several days. I plan to make a third batch which I will allow to soak for several months.

(Another warning: The walnuts, water, and ink all have a high capacity for staining anything they come into contact with. This includes kitchen counters, fingernails, dishes, wooden spoons, and your clothing.)


Step 4. Dismantle the walnuts. Tear, mash, and break them up. The more little pieces one can get, the better. Remember, the rotten, black pulp material is the stuff that turns the water into ink.

With my first batch, I tore them up before I soaked them. With my second batch, I didn’t really break up the husks until they were cooking. Step 4 can kind of be inserted anywhere in the soaking step, or early in the cooking step (Step 5.)

Use this water, which at this point has started to turn black from the walnut juice, for the next step.



Step 5. With the walnuts still covered in their (now-blackened) water, put them on a medium-low heat. Let them simmer for a long time—hours. If the water gets too low, you can add more. The goal, though, is to let it slowly cook down.

Periodically, dip a brush into it and test the liquid on some paper to see how dark it is. Once the liquid is as dark as you want it, your ink is nearly done. It has probably cooked down quite a bit by this point.

The smell of the boiling walnuts is distinct, but not especially strong or unpleasant. It reminded me of rotten logs and damp forest.

Step 6. Let the dark brown mess cool for a while, and then strain it. The best method I’ve found so far is to stretch an old pair of nylons over a glass or plastic container, and pour the walnut sludge into it. Squeeze the sludge in the nylons to get as much liquid out of it as you can. Empty the walnut crumbs out of the nylons into the garbage (or your hedge, or compost heap, or your neighbor’s porch) and repeat until you’ve strained all the liquid into your container. Your container should now hold ink, free from all but small bits of sediment. This sediment, which will settle at the bottom of jars, shouldn’t be a problem.I tried letting the muck drain through coffee filters. I don't recommend it. It was painfully slow and messy.
A page from my sketchbook, where I was testing and playing with the walnut ink.

Straining the ink. I put an old pair of nylons over the opening of a large plastic can that pretzels came in. After I filled it partially with walnut sludge, I pulled it out and squeezed it over the glass bowl. By the time I was done, the glass bowl was nearly full of the ink.





Step 7. You might want to add a preservative, since the ink can grow mold. The best recommendation I’ve heard so far is to add a small amount of denatured alcohol (add it so that it constitutes 5% of the ink). Salt would also work, but salt can lead to corrosion in metal pen nibs. Vinegar also can retard mold and bacterial growth, but its acidity renders the ink non-archival.

Optional: Most black walnut ink makers recommend the addition of gum arabic to improve the ink’s flow.


Results so far:11-8-07: After a couple of batches homemade black walnut ink, I am unsatisfied with the ink’s darkness. I tried taking a couple of jars and boiling them down further, and the ink did become more concentrated. The ink also became a little thicker and didn’t flow as well. This might be where the gum arabic would come in handy, but I haven’t bought any yet. A 2 ½ jar at the art store runs about twelve dollars. If I had that kind of money, I wouldn’t be making my own ink! Heh heh. I may try buying some powdered gum arabic on Ebay.

Even though the ink isn’t as dark as I’d like, it still is pretty nice. I think I might be able to make the next batch darker by letting the walnuts soak a lot longer—months, instead of days.

I am also running a lightfastness test with the ink on the dashboard of my car.

I will edit this post periodically as I learn more.

2-7-2012:  I guess I should add another update.  A couple of months ago I made another batch of ink from walnuts that I had sitting in a pot in my garage for about two years. Or was it three?  Anyway, they were sitting covered in water for a very long time.  I've read that there are chemicals in walnuts that discourage mold growth, and that must be true, for there was no mold in the walnuts. (Then why does the ink grow mold, I wonder?)

       These walnuts had also been soaking with some old nuts and bolts to add some iron content, on the theory that it would darken the ink.  I don't kow whether it was this iron, or the age of the walnuts, or a combination of the two, but the ink came out noticeably darker than previous batches.

6-27-13: Another brief update.  I am still using ink from previous batches and have not made any ink since that mentioned in the update above.  But to elaborate on the above point, I recently had four drawings side-by-side: three done with the newest batch of ink, which had very aged walnuts as well as rusty metal added to the mix, and one drawing done with an older batch that had not sat around soaking as long and which had not metal in it.

   The first three were brown, but were more of a charcoaly brown, whereas the the one had more of a burnt sienna appearance.

   My goal had been to make a darker ink, but comparing them, I think I actually like the browner one more.  It just has a more vibrant feel.