Procreate Tutorial: Inking Techniques

Learn the tricks and techniques to ink your sketch in Procreate, along with the best brushes for the task, with Óscar Lloréns

Full of resources, Procreate allows you to give the perfect finishing touch to your creations through the use of simple, intuitive tools. The illustrator Óscar Lloréns (@ollorens), whose body of work includes creations for Coca-Cola, the United Nations and Cirque du Soleil, as well as artistic pieces exhibited in Spain, Mexico, France and China, is an expert in this versatile programme and here he will teach us the technique of inking.

It’s all about a classic drawing technique that consists of inking your sketch so you can later color the inside of the lines. This technique is usually used in comic and classic manga. You can find out more below:

5 steps to a perfect inking with procreate

1. Choose a round brush from the painting section.

Different to what it may seem, Óscar recommends using a brush not from the inking section, but from the painted one. The reason is that the paintbrushes have a more rounded finish, which allows the illustrator to draw more neat and simple lines. Inking brushes, meanwhile, produce a more textured effect, imitating real brushes or marker pens.

2. Reduce the opacity of the sketch and paint in a layer over it.

After choosing the color black to perform the inking of the sketch, it’s time to reduce its opacity and select a layer over it to start drawing. This enables you to trace over the original line of yor sketch; if you want an analogy, it’s like putting tracing paper over a page. To draw different parts more quickly, the professor recommends doing it with separate layers.

3. Activate the asymmetry and choose a medium-sized brush

To carry out the inking more quickly, activate the asymmetric mode. Now, when you perform a trace over, for example, a character’s head, this function will reproduce it on the other side of the drawing, as if it was a mirror. The recommended brush size is medium.

4. For a perfect circle, press down on it with the pencil and click in the screen

According to the situation, you may want a trace that looks hand-drawn or one that is perfect. For this second option, there is a very simple shortcut in Procreate that enables you to achieve the ideal finish. When you draw the circle by hand, press down with the pencil and then click over the screen. You will see how the magic is done: the twisted circle becomes a perfect one. This is a particularly interesting option for the eyes, the cranium and other parts of your drawing.

5. For a perfect line, draw it and press on it with the pencil

Likewise, you may be looking for a “line”, either twisted or perfectly aligned. For the best possible lines, all you need to do is press down with the pencil at the point where you have stopped tracing.

Have you enjoyed this tutorial? Remember that you can learn with Óscar Lloréns to take on an illustration project using different techniques, enabling you to find your own style. You can find his online course here.

You might also be interested in:

- Digital Illustration With Procreate, a course by Óscar Lloréns
- Express Illustration for Press, a course by Óscar Lloréns
- Express Illustration with Illustrator and Photoshop, a course by Óscar Lloréns