Ball Point Pen Portraits
Back in the 1980s I was drawing in a sketchbook just as I am today. But back then I didn’t have any fancy pens, I just had regular black ball point pens. The good part of that is I could almost always guarantee I could find a pen if I needed to. The bad part…well, now that I look back on these drawings I am not sure there was a bad part. The cool thing about ball point pens is it isn’t all or nothing like my Copic ink pens are. I could press soft and get a soft line or hard to get a more solid line. That allowed for an ability to subtle shading that my Copic pens don’t allow. Maybe I will go back to the ball point, who knows!
I am not in contact with any of these people any longer. I often wonder what they look like now and think it would be fun to go back and draw them 30-40 years later! If you happen to know any of them, let them know their portrait from long ago is online.
These drawings were either done at Cabrillo College or Mission College where I taught, Eulipia Restaurant where I worked, Westminster Presbyterian Church or Asbury Methodist Church where I attended.