Coloring with Alcohol-Ink Fillable Pens

Hi there! Today I’d like to share how I use alcohol-ink fillable pens. The artist trading card (ATC) shown above was made using them.

Alcohol-ink fillable pens are a unique tool that allows you to color with your Ranger alcohol inks and/or blending solution. Here is a video from Ranger describing how to color with alcohol-ink fillable pens:

What I love about Ranger is that they are all about helping you make your own art your way. They are in business to sell products, but they come right out and tell you that you do NOT have to buy one of these pens for every shade you have of alcohol ink! Use blending solution instead! This is great for those of us on a budget! Love you, Ranger! ♥

If you’re interested, here is another video about alcohol-ink fillable pens and using them with the alcohol ink inside.

Fill with blending solution, not the inks!

Use a plastic paint palette with little wells (like this one at Simon Says Stamp). Put two to four drops of alcohol ink into each well. Then fill the alcohol ink pen with blending solution only. Use the alcohol ink pen to dip into the colors and paint with them. When you’ve finished using a color, wipe it onto scrap paper until that color no longer shows, and you’re ready for the next color!

I have a plastic palette with 10 wells, and just two alcohol-ink fillable pens: one for warm shades and one for cool shades. I especially like to use them to color on glossy cardstock. For example, the Sunshine Flowers ATC (63rd) shown above was made using alcohol-ink fillable pens.

Sunshine Flowers ATC (63rd)

To make this ATC, I started with a piece of glossy cardstock. I stamped Hero Arts K5586 Daisies and the “spread sunshine” sentiment from Hero Arts CL129 Anytime Messages onto the gloss paper using a black dye ink that I heat set. As Debbie says in the Ranger video, make sure to use dye ink and that it is really, really dry on the glossy cardstock!

Once the ink was dry, I used my alcohol-ink fillable pens and alcohol inks in a paint palette with wells to color in the image. I added metallic pink elastic cord and some golden jewels, then adhered it to a pink ATC base.

Thanks for stopping by!

{ 4 appreciated comments }

1 Paula November 19, 2012 at 6:08 am: Anne this is a gorgeous ATC. I like your use of the Alcohol inks.
2 Janj November 19, 2012 at 10:01 am: Thanks so much Anne for sharing this technique and video to use 1 refillable alcohol pen. I bought a few fillable pens prior to packing my craft supplies so they are waiting for me to use! The 2nd video was helpful too…what a fast and easy way to color the gems, pearls, brads and other metal embellishments! LOVE alcohol inks!
Anne your ATC is fantastic…thanks for sharing!
3 Lisa Cousineau November 19, 2012 at 5:18 pm: I filled my pen with alcohol solution and tried using it like you described and it just drips all over the place. I think it’s broken :-(
4 Dawn T November 20, 2012 at 12:58 am: thanks for sharing this Anne. I’ve never seen the pen, but love the idea of using it. Really extends the use of the inks.