Drawing a 1969 Ford F250 Camper in Ink

Drawing America hosts an informal and informative online session with Denver-based sketch artist Paul Heaston.

Feb 16, 2025

My Paul Heaston-esque drawing of a 1969 Ford F250 Camper.

One of my absolute favorite sketch artists is Paul Heaston, whom I have written about before. He uses pen, pencil, and ink wash to create beautiful sketches of cars, places, and people.

Late last night I was excited to see that Drawing America and Paul Heaston would be hosting a drawing workshop on Sunday for only $15! Of course I signed up right away.

Although Paul demonstrated how to draw a farm tractor for the group, I chose to work from a different one of his reference photos, a 1969 Ford F250 Camper.

Paul often sits in his car and draws interesting vintage vehicles like this one. Sometimes he starts directly with ink, and other times he lays down a loose pencil scaffolding on which to build the ink.

I took the pencil approach with my sketch of the Ford—probably adding more detail than Paul would have done in that stage, out of an abundance of caution.

First thirty minutes—pencil

After the first thirty minutes I had this pencil sketch done. I began by placing three vertical lines: the corner of the vehicle in the middle of the paper, and then the left and right sides.

From this, I built out major proportional measurements like top, bottom, separation of camper attachment from the truck, and wheels, and then some secondary features like windows, placement of the hubs and a rough version of the grille.

Second thirty minutes—pen

In the next stage I used an 03 Micron pen to commit to my lines, trying to stay somewhat loose and expressive. You can see I ran into proportion issues around the tires, and had to move lines after they had already been inked.

Paul mentioned how pen lines can represent shading, but they can also describe texture. To avoid confusion, he will sometimes designate clustered vertical lines as “shading lines” and other kinds of lines as “texture lines.” I decided to try that out in this drawing.

Third thirty minutes—black, hatching

In this stage I used a larger Micron brush pen to fill in solid black areas, and vertical hatch lines to indicate shading. Some other kinds of ink marks indicate texture and details such as ventilation openings, rivets, or the roundness of the tire walls.

Last thirty minutes—ink washes

In the last stage I doubled down on shading using two water brushes filled with a pale gray and a darker gray permanent ink.

I wasn’t sure what to do with the windshield which had a foil heat reflector in it, so I left it fairly simple.

Sometimes I placed a little gray ink then smeared it with my finger, like in the shadow on the ground.

My finished drawing is my version of channeling of Paul’s style, although he is much more adept at drawing like Paul Heaston than I am.

Technical issues

I had an issue of the brushes frequently “burping” out ink, and had to occasionally blot on a towel before touching my drawing. I think the problem is that the ink reservoir warms up in your hand (ink is contained in the handle) and becomes pressurized.

Maybe I should have gotten the water brushes acclimated to my body temperature in my pocket, then ventilated the reservoir before starting.

I used a white pen to touch up the wheel hubs where I made some messy extra pen lines.

Materials

I began with a Blackwing pencil and white eraser, then moved on to the 03 Micron.

Later I added solid black with a Micron brush pen, and used the 08 Micron for heavier lines.

Two water brushes filled with different dilutions of permanent gray ink were used after that, and a white paint marker was used for minor corrections.