279 Chrome Plate

Sometimes a few simple techniques can help pen, ink, and paper mimic real materials.  This rounded outlined Gothic alphabet, for instance, can be filled in with tones of gray to make it look like Chrome Plate.

1. Outline the letter using water-proof ink such as india or Higgins.
2. Draw light guidelines that divide the letters into thirds. To keep them invisible, you can draw them on the back of the paper and work on a light table.   
3. Fill the bottom half of the letters with water-soluble black ink or paint.  Fill the middle third with a diluted gray tone of the black, blurring the edge between the two.  Then use the palest gray you can mix to fill in the top.  These grays imitate the reflected sky, curb, and pavement that are characteristic of chrome car logos. 

Note: use bluish-black to fill the letters, not warm sepia.  Brush or pen?  Depends on size.

Round these off to look like chrome.  

Note: to help your letters look like they are made of metal, imagine chrome in the real world.  You'll probably want to thicken the thin parts of the letter, since tiny hairlines and sharp corners are not characteristic of solid chrome.  
Look at chrome logos on cars for ideas.  The designs take two basic approaches: each separate letter can be attached one by one, or the whole logo can be turned into an inter-connected whole.

Once you've learned this technique, you can Chrome Plate anything. 

Like Gothic Highlight