I’ve been scouring my photo archives for interesting black and whites with interesting geometric composition and a full range of tonal values.

For today’s experiment I found a street photo of a dumpster and a staircase that fit the bill.  Here is my pen and ink rendition of the scene:

Carting – Pen and Ink
3″x4.5″ 140# Cold Pressed

I drew in pencil before inking, as I don’t yet trust myself with the permanence of ink without the scaffolding of an underlying sketch.

After finishing the inking (and erasing of the pencil), I used Derwent wash pencils to enhance the tonal values from darkest dark, to lightest light.

Carting – Pen and Ink + Gray Wash
3″x4.5″ 140# Cold Pressed

I did not photoshop either of these images, so I attribute the tonal variation between the two, to the reflectance of the untoned paper of the pen and ink version versus that of the gray-toned paper of the washed version.