Scumbling Technique

Basically, scumbling is circular strokes. It is used by colored pencil artists to render smooth textures, such as skin. The strokes are very tiny, and you can’t easily see them in the finished piece. I use it as a decorative stroke, as my go-to shading around a motif, and to add texture. You need to make sure your pencils are very sharp. This technique also works well with lots of different colors layered for a whimsical feeling.

Materials

• Colored pencils
• Stamp
• Black inkpad
• Drawing paper

Stamp your image onto drawing paper using a black ink pad.

Scumbling is a fairly easy stroke to render; just follow the main rule of colored pencils by starting lightly and adding layers to get darker values. Try to hold the pencil with an extended tripod grip for very light strokes. Start with the lightest color and very lightly add scumbling to denote the different color fields.

With the next color layer, add a bit more pressure, and make the circular strokes smaller and closer to the inside line of the motif. Adding basic shading strokes helps with filling in the tiny spaces.

The finished drawing shows all of the colors applied. Scumbling adds beautiful texture to your drawing and makes the mouse in this example soft and furry. The scumbling here really takes off in creating movement with the wishes blowing away from the dandelion.

Ideas and Samples

Some of the samples on this page, such as the oak leaf and owl, show adding scumbling to outline or halo an image. I really like scumbling when I have an image with swirls, like the owl it helps maximize the movement of the swirls and curls, bringing interest and whimsy to the coloring. Scumbling is also used to render a texture when coloring. When artists use this stroke on large drawings, the effect is amazing. You cannot see the individual circular strokes, because they are made very lightly and with many layers. Skin colored with scumbling looks like living flesh. Scumbling was also used for texture on the walnut in the mouse card; it gave the walnut a different texture than the mouse, which was done with the striking stroke, and the flower, which was done with basic shading. The water was also colored with light scumbling.

Scumbling Tip

Be careful not to repeat the circular strokes right next to one another, or else it will look like corkscrews all over the drawing. This often happens when you halo an image with scumbling. Keep the strokes random and going in many different directions. I noticed that while I do this stroke, I continually turn the pencil in my hand. It keeps the strokes working from a sharp point and helps to make them more random.