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Today, I tried using water-soluble graphite as paint. I built up washes of progressively darker tones until I formed the entire picture.

Unfortunately, I used low quality brushes and didn't have a way to test how dark my washes were. This lead to some spots where I went way too dark way too quickly (hence, this female skateboarder has a beard).

I managed to block in the entire pose again. The unpredictability of the medium lead to a more spontaneous look which captured the energy of the pose more accurately than just lines. Most importantly, the lack of control over tone left me with some really great dark tones I usually tend to avoid.

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