To see the inspiration for this piece, read yesterday's blog

Armed with my ink, I gathered together some tools to draw with.

A travel toothbrush

My dip pen

A cotton bud

A twig

A stick I found that had a sawn, shaped end.

A dried flower stem.

I've previously used Winsor & Newton's black ink which claims to be water resistant. However, on an acrylic paint ground, the ink doesn't adhere, so wipes clean off. Logic told me that I should try acrylic ink instead. I bought Daler Rowney Artist Acrylic Ink in black (because it was the only one that my local art shop had in store). I tested some on a used canvas, washed over with some acrylic paint and stroked it with a baby wipe. The ink remained in place "unsmudged", so good result!

Before launching into my painting, however, I wanted to see what type of marks each tool would give me.

I loved the variety of line that the twig and shaped stick gave me, the cotton bud was reliable in terms of ink flow, but the line was pretty boring, the toothbrush and dried flower stem were awesome for a broken unpredictable line, the dip worked great in my sketchbook, but once I started to draw on canvas it couldn't cope with the rough surface. I would have to make sure I sand, or run over the painting with acetone really well to achieve a flat smooth ground before using the dip pen.