Watercolour Pens Plus Big Brush Markers: An Experiment

I like to use my Ecoline watercolour pens for colouring as they are so vibrant, but I also like to add shading with my Faber-Castell Big Brush Markers.  I have never used them on the same image before, as the Big Brush Markers need a non porous background to work on and sealing in watercolours with a gel medium has always resulted in a mess before now.  As you can see from my finished journal page, I have managed to solve the problem.  To see how, you will need to read on...
This page was created for the April monthly prompt for 2018 over on Nina Ribena's Art Journal Prompts and More.  The prompt is 'Spring' and it has barely stopped raining since the start of April.  Hopefully this page will change matters.

I had at the back of my mind an art journal page that Vicky Papaioannou created a long time ago (see HERE), where she drew the image of a girl holding an umbrella.  I drew my image before going to look back at Vicky's page and as you will see if you compare the two pages, my image (and the finished page) is rather different.  I am grateful to Vicky for the inspiration however.
I started by sketching my image onto a piece of left over mixed media card and cutting it out.

I then went back over the lines that I wanted to keep with a black Pitt Artist pen and erased the pencil marks.

The image was coloured directly onto the card using my Royal Talens Ecoline watercolour brush pens, except for the jeans which were coloured using the Faded Jeans Distress marker.

I then started on the background, blending Broken China, Blueprint Sketch, Faded Jeans, Mermaid Lagoon and Hickory Smoke Distress Oxides over a piece of mixed media card (18.5cm x 19.5cm).

I gave it a heavier spritz of water than I normally would before drying it, as I wanted the effect of rain in the background.

As I was sealing the Distress Oxides with Distress Glaze,  I decided to experiment to see if it would work over the colouring on the focal image.  Having experimented on a scrap piece of card,  I went over the girl with Distress Glaze, then used my Faber-Castell Big Brush markers and Pitt Artist pens to add shading, blending the colour with my fingers and cotton buds (Q Tips).  Eureka,  it worked brilliantly!

Having added the image to the background, I used the same method to add shading around the focal point and help it blend into the page.

I made up the quote that I was planning to use with the Worn Text alphabet (Tim Holtz / Stampers' Anonymous).  Each word was stamped individually using the Tim Holtz stamp platform, twice in Cobalt Archival ink, then once with Versamark ink and heat embossing in detail clear EP.

I used my white Amsterdam Acrylic marker to add interest to each letter.

The page was finished by adding spatters of watered down iridescent silver Pebeo Dyna Acrylic paint.