Hey its MangaKid again! I'm back^^
This time, I'm going to talk about the infamous Colourless Blender. Some of you might of first thought it is a tool to blend your Copic colours. THAT IS NOT THE CASE! But the Colourless Blender aka CB is still a valuable marker. As you can see in the photo below, it looks just like a normal marker without colour. And after using it on top of another colour, the tip will get soiled but that will not ruin it. Just make sure that you scribble on a separate paper to get the excess colour off before using your CB again somewhere else. I've had bad experiences when I go from using the CB on a dark colour on a character's shirt right to trying to smudge something off the character's face. Big mistake.
So if the CB doesn't strictly blend, what does it do? It can do the following:
-Lightens/fades colour
-Softens any streaking
-Pushes colours
-Special effects
Lets start with how it lightens/fades colours. Take a dark colour like blue for example. If you colour a blue circle on a sheet of paper and then go over it with the CB, it might bleed a bit while also thinning your colour. I usually use it if I want to dull or lighten a certain part of my drawing or a certain colour. Do you want to smudge a colour too? I find that the CB does that fairly well.
Copics rarely streak, but they will streak if you colour in a fashion that allows your previous layer to dry. It only takes practice and experience to learn how to most effectively colour your artwork without over-lapping where you don't want to. In this process, the colourless blender can help out! Just go over anywhere where there is streaking. It should even it out a little bit, but keep in mind that you'll have to cover the full area with CB. If not, you'll just make it worse as the streaking will turn to blotching.
Recently, on my Four Swords artwork, I had to use my CB over the bottom of the gameboy and in the reflection streaks. It blended and also smoothed out my colours. Maybe in the future, I can get some pictures of my process ^_^
It also acts as a repellant to the Copic marker colours. Thats how you can push your colours around. Be careful, cuz where ever your CB is, your original copic colour will start spreading away from it! But with the CB, you can also fix your mistakes! Any bleeding or maybe a colour came outside the lines? The colourless blender will be able to push it back into your drawing with only a little stain (it matters how fast you get to the mistake though!) Usually, when I make a mistake, I grab that CB and start pushing my wayward colour back into the lines as fast as I can before it dries. But take note that the colourless blender still will work on dry colours. Its a good way to wet your paper again if you ever need to.
Ah the special effects! The CB can create some cool designs on your copic colours! Look in the video below to see some ideas!
Watch this great tutorial video about tips on how to use the Colourless Blender (Give credit to the video creator, not me. I own nothing!)
And here's another good video with some examples of what and what not to do!
I hope that all made sense! Please let me know if you have questions!!!
