Burning Man #3 cover - Pencils

As you can see from this pencil version, Brett filled the image with detail without suggesting any contour lines or spoting of black areas. Any inker with a well-trained eye knows where to pick up from there, to add dimension in the ink stage. Except for the leg area, the fade where the knees would be, there is no light-source. This suggests a general ambient light, by use of Brett's rendering which almost resembles scratches or fabric stitching.
I took it from there and went hog wild with my faithful #104 quill. On a lot of the rendering lines, I simulated a stitching effect, where I begin with a fat dollop of ink, scoot my line over, then finish with another healthy dollop.
To avoid too much repetition in the lines, some would be flat, dead lines. The contours of the trees were important, as were the collecting black knots in the tree. When inking trees, it's crucial to bow the arc of the rendering lines to the shape, or your tree limb shapes could be lost.

Penciller: Brett Booth