In October of 2015, my brother brought Avengers: Age of Ultron over to watch with me. I loved the playful-but-sinister use of the classic Pinocchio lyric, “There are no strings on me.” I like to keep my hands busy when watching anything, and I had the idea of practicing with a flex nib dip pen and creating a flowing design that looked like it was strings forming the letters.
Pencil on dot grid paper.
Flex nib dip pen with India ink.
Liquify tool in Photoshop, first edit.
Liquify tool in Photoshop, second edit.
Pen tool in Illustrator.
Pen tool in Illustrator. Shown: anchor placement and handles.
Rope brush applied to linework in Illustrator.
