Virtual Paint Out - Rome

This month's Virtual Paint Out location is Rome. So much to see and choose from here.

If you want to see what I was working from click here.

I pushed my Bienfang sketchbook paper well beyond its water media capabilities and ended up overworking it.

But while my perspective is not perfect, I was quite pleased over all with the drawing, which took about 15 minutes to complete. I do wish I had scanned it before adding in colour though.

I really need to do a value study of the original and compare it to mine so I can see where I would need to fix it if the paper were to tolerate it. I know in my heart and mind that value studies are a key tool to being happy with the finished product but my lack of patience always gets in my way. 

ETA- In the meantime, I put this into drafts while I searched out how to do a screencapture - easy, peasy in the end. So here are the images in grayscale. This really does help me to see the value and perspective lines better and not get caught up in the details, which is what usually happens.

 

Okay, definitely need to add routinely doing value studies to my New Year's art resolutions LOL!
 

Another post

Nothing posted for a couple of weeks and then two in one day. This is one of the sketches I did when we were studying contour drawings a number of weeks ago in Sketchbook Skool.

I wasn't sure how I felt about it at first but now, after not seeing it for awhile, I'm quite taken with the results. Gotta love complimentary colours!

It was done using a photo reference from a class I took years ago where we all brought items in according to the theme of the week - fruit, vegetables, glass, metallic etc and then spent the afternoon putting together still life setups to photograph for our own reference libraries.

Bird's eye view II

Several months ago, I had done a small watercolour sketch of Abbeydale for Nan and Tom's summer party. That led to a request for a bigger version incorporating part of the hamlet surrounding them.

It took me awhile for my brain to get the perspective right when working only from satellite photos but I'm finally happy with the outcome. The preliminary sketch looked like this-
 

I've scrubbed the name out since it didn't make the final cut anyway and for privacy sake because it includes friends' names. The final piece is a combination of pen, watercolour and watercolour pencil work.

Sketchbook Skool 'Seeing' Week #6

This past week's instructor was Liz Steel, an Australian architect and sketcher. The key point being tackled is dealing with a complicated shape/pattern or structure by breaking it down into its simpler components. In the second assignment we'll be doing a building but first up is a patterned teacup and saucer.

Small thumbnail sketches show the detail of the pattern on the saucer and one panel of the cup. Grid lines are used to establish proportions. Since this is meant to be a quick sketch and not an exact replica, wonkiness is  perfectly acceptable. Thank goodness because my cup looks like it's getting compressed by the text to its right LOL.  I enjoyed doing the exercise and it's such a sensible way to approach a complicated or heavily patterned object.

At the Printers

Finally got my cards off to the printers this morning, hopefully to be picked up tomorrow so I can get them packaged up for sale. If things work out to plan that only puts me 4 days behind where I was last year at this time. Considering my xmas muse was late arriving - I tried to book her in for mid October but she was having none of that - I'm quite happy about that.

I ended up with four new designs, just not the ones I originally thought I would. In the end, the row of xmas balls seen below just didn't speak to me when it came time to putting it into card format. Neither did Claire the Christmas sheep (sorry Alison, by next year she should be ready). However, I did manage a humourous snow man and a more traditional bit of pinecones, holly and ribbon that I liked. These two, along with Rudy aka One Cool Dude and this year's Nuki and Friends will round out the class of 2014.

Note to self: images for printing were scanned at 300dpi with contrast increased to 20 in the hopes that the colours will be much more true to life when they're printed. Last year's colours needed to be more saturated - hopefully they now don't come out too garish, yikes. Time will tell.

Sophie waiting for Santa

Another card

I'm certainly not the first to put a reindeer in sunglasses but I do like the look of this fellow. The white was masked out with ordinary scotch tape and the rest of the paper flooded with paint. I continued to play with it until I had the mottled background I wanted.

 

I think Rudy is going to make the cut for xmas cards this year. I've also been playing with a circle template that I bought recently and that led to thinking about xmas balls, which led to the next card idea.

 

Instead of watercolour, these are coloured with Tombow markers, a new medium for me since I started with sketching classes this summer. They easily retain their vibrancy and dilute well when hit with a bit of water.

I was attempting to get some sort of depth of field by varying the size of balls and thickness of line but it didn't really work. Oh well, I like them anyway. 

 

 

 

 

SBS Seeing week 4

One of my favourite nature artists, Cathy Johnson, was our instructor this past week. Several of Cathy's books have made it into my art library over the years and I've followed her blog as well. You'd be hard pressed to find a more generous soul and she didn't disappoint in her teaching.

We were to paint from nature and now that the cold weather has returned some old friends have returned to the yard. Cardinals are plentiful around here and the males in their red brilliance are certainly eye catching but I do love the soft tawny colours of the female of the species. This was painted from a photo taken on our farm.

I'd love to spend more time doing the gesture drawing of birds from life, trying to capture their essence before they move or fly away but that will have to wait until later in the winter, when time slows down again.

The next lesson for Sketchbook Skool has already arrived in my inbox as well as the first concept from Sketching Now - Foundations. These two courses overlap for a few weeks so between classwork and getting my xmas cards in production - well let's just say my time management skills are getting a good workout as well.

Coming along

Nuki and I had a lovely chat this afternoon and most of the major decisions are made except we can't decide what colour his hat band should be. I'm pretty sure it's going to end up being a dull red but decided to let that percolate overnight in case I have a lightbulb moment. I just can't quite let go of the idea of plaid but am not sure it would look the way I envision it and I think it would be a distraction so it stays blank until tomorrow.

Looking at it here I see I also need to darken his hat. That, plus all of the shadows still need to be put in so fingers crossed he'll be finished tomorrow. Then I just have to get him into card format so we can go off to the local print store sometime this week.

Cat hair not included - dang stuff gets everywhere!

More contour drawing

More practice with contour line drawing and adding watercolour. Funny, I'm now starting to look at objects as to whether they'd be a good subject for this kind of drawing. Even if I don't actually draw it, I'm sorting out in my head where I 'd start.

This is a (somewhat skewed) drawing of a pewter candlestick with floral candle ring and a small bowl from Pier1 that sit atop an old pine secretary desk at the moment. The linework was done with a ProArt 0.8mm pen, which bleeds quite nicely when touched with a wet brush.

I also did a sketch of a matching piece of ceramic holder for salt and pepper shakers that does not want to bend to my will and be posted where I want it posted. I do love blogger as a platform - it meets my needs quite nicely most of the time, but it doesn't always let me put images where I want them.

So I end up rambling on, like I'm doing now, so that the page ends up looking as near to the way I see it in my head. Brown Tombow pen for the linework. I tried mixing the paint on the paper but it ran together into a hot mess. I was a bit more patient when doing the bowl above and am much happier with the paint flow in it.
I used to think of myself as a patient person but I'm finding out this just isn't true LOL.

Conversation

Despite some long term neglect, it seems Nuki and I are finally back on speaking terms. There's still a lot more to do with it but I'm pleased with how things are going thus far.

I have a few other ideas as well but I'm not yet happy with the drawings for them so they'll continue to float around in the ether for awhile.

New Day

Okay, so I don't hate it today LOL!

It's amazing what a figurative and literal step back will do for perspective. I was able to eliminate the weak lines of the plate with my little paint dot net program and that made a huge difference for me. Got rid of a distraction and let me look at the piece itself.

I think all that I need to do is glaze some more layers on the remaining cherries in order to get the depth of colour I'm liking in the middle left one.

Glazing is something that I don't have much experience with but there's only one way to get it so I have nothing to lose with this little study.

Still have more contour drawing to do but here's the single object I did for the first part of the assignment. It's the little sprayer bottle I use to wet my palette. Tombow marker done in my sketchbook.  The next assigment involves a still life grouping of three objects, contour drawing with watercolour applied later. I want to set up something with a variety of shapes yet have a unifying theme so will have to have a look around the house.

ETA: not sure why the image here looks like some of the vertical lines are broken. Must be how it scanned. Clicking on the image will show you what it really looks like.

On a different front Nuki is speaking to me once again so I'm going to spend the afternoon working on him and his cardinal friends.

Nuki's not talking to me

Clearly my little inukshuk character Nuki is peeved with me. I've been neglecting him for months now, giving all my attention to new classes and ideas. Now that the holidays are approaching I've sat down and sketched out some ideas for this year's xmas cards. I have a few, one or two I really like so you would think all systems would be go to paint them. You would be wrong.

Instead, this is what shows up on my paper.  Inspired by the graphic on an Avoca HandweaversTM coffee mug - a sheep that I've dressed, not in one of their fabrics but in the family tartan of a dear friend. She's been calling to me to paint her ever since Kate brought the mug home a few weeks ago, so I'm hoping that now that I've done her, I can get into Nuki mode. Otherwise I'm slapping a xmas bow on her!

SBS Seeing Week 1

Fast and Slow exercise

One of this week's assignments is to first draw quickly, with a wet medium, the basic silhouette of an object. In my case it was a teal plastic sprayer bottle that I use to wet my palette box paints. This should be done in roughly one minute.

Then, using pen draw a much more detailed sketch over top of the first one. The hardest part for me was ignoring the painted undersketch in order to get the correct perspective for the ink sketch. I kept wanting to incorporate the painted bits LOL.

It was a lot of fun to do and I'll definitely try it again but I think the thing that surprised me the most was how recognizable the undersketch was considering it was pretty much just dashed off. Not bad for someone who has a hard time forgoing erasable pencil lines and working directly in pen. Drawing with paint is just madness I say LOL.

Now I have to finish the other part of this week's assignment which is to draw a piece of toast; a very detailed drawing of all the nooks and crannies.  Being wheat free for well over a year, obtaining the toast was the first challenge. Thanks Nan! Will post when it's completed...

Consider this as 'toast in two parts'! The basic outline and left hand side of the toast were done while doing the 'deep diving into the drawing'. Goal achieved. Then along came Cous, my carb obsessed Abyssinian.  I was so focused on my toast road map, which again was the whole point of the exercise, that he managed twice to grab it and run off with it, the little beggar. Found himself in timeout after that!

But I can see that my concentration was broken as I started in again, this time from the right hand side of the toast. Sigh. I've lost my enthusiasm for the task as well so I'm stopping here. Besides, week 2's lesson is already in my inbox and I'm ready to move on.

Autumn Goodies

We waited to celebrate Canadian Thanksgiving until this weekend when the whole family could be together.

Since Nan was making her always delicious roasted stuffed pork, Kate decided to complement this with applesauce made from scratch.  This turned out so tasty that it just had to be presented in a nicely shaped jar. And what is a jar without a pretty label.

Done with watercolour pencil on 20 lb plain white paper, hence the ripples in the scanned picture LOL.

Stratford sketch

During Kate's recent visit we went on a drive to nearby Stratford. While she did some shopping, I drove down by the river to do some sketching. There were lots of people enjoying the beautiful summer weather, some with their dogs, others with kids. 

As always there were plenty of Canada geese hanging around but this fellow caught my eye. Swans are such elegant, graceful creatures on the water and yet quite ungainly and awkward moving about on land. Reminded me of my earlier trip there with Nan in April to see the annual parade bringing the swans out of their winter housing and onto the river.

I did a preliminary sketch on site using a Prussian Blue watercolour pencil and then painted it in studio this morning. The background is a mishmash of blue, green and violet watercolour pencil washed over with a layer of DS Undersea Green.

Abbeydale Anniversary

This weekend marks the second anniversary of Nan and Tom's move to Abbeydale, their home in the nearby hamlet of Carlisle. Each occasion has been celebrated with a large party and last year Nan requested I paint a portrait of their house to use for the invitation.

Because I did not trust that my drawing skills were up to the task, I printed out an outline of the house using a photoediting program, reinforced some of the lines and then painted it in watercolour. The flowers were quite lost so I repainted them in acrylic for a bit of added punch. All in all I was quite happy with it.

This time around, Kate had found a pretty card showing a bird's eye view of a street in Stratford and requested that I try and replicate something similar for this year.

It was a bit of a struggle at first, I can't deny it. Trying to morph a satellite view of the property with my own photo references to get the desired perspective (streetview is not available for Carlise on google maps as of yet LOL). After trying to get it right for a few hours and not succeeding I did the smart thing and stepped away for a few hours. Had lunch, had a nap and came back to my drawing with renewed enthusiasm. Always a good idea.

This is done in a more illustrative style, with less attention to detail and accuracy than the picture above. Of course, this is not the final version of the painting as is typical for me once I felt it was done I signed it, matted it and wrapped it before I remembered to scan it! Duh. Oh well. The changes made were minimal so no one will know that but me and I can live with that.

The land was such a blank canvas when Tom and Nan bought the property that it will be fun to document the changes they make over time. It'll also be interesting to see what style and potentially what medium I might render it in as well. This year's was definitely influenced by my time spent at Sketchbook Skool. Who knows what might be influencing me next year.

Sketchbook Skool Week #6

Our instructor this week was Tommy Kane, a New York artist new to me. Tommy's philosophy is slooooooow down and draw lots of detail. And no starting over - once you've committed to a drawing keep pushing through, even if you feel you've screwed up. It really is amazing how what seem like huge mistakes in the beginning just don't really matter much in the end. Yes, they're still there but so what. Our assignment was to draw our kitchens and plan to spend anywhere from 5-8 hrs doing it.

When I first read about Sketchbook Skool a few months back on some of the art blogs I follow this was the assignment that they were all talking about LOL. I must admit, I wasn't looking forward to it in the beginning because it just seemed so overwhelming. BUT, now, having completed it, it proved to be very interesting. It was fun, frustrating, daunting and overall well worth every minute spent on it. I have a new appreciation for those skilled in crosshatching as a drawing technique. It required much more thought and attention to line than I originally thought. This assignment wraps up the first semester of SBS. I'm hoping they'll be rerunning the second term in October because I'll be there! 

ETA: I've tinkered a bit more with my sketch - I noticed that the white bowl in the glass doored cupboard on the right looked as if it was going to fall out, so I hit it with a bit of shadow to push it back behind the doorknob and it looks better to me now. I added my signature as well, to truly finish it off.

Sketching Out in Public. Twice

Mission accomplished. Last week I got my haircut and while I was waiting for Kate to finish up I took out my sketchbook and started drawing one of the shelves. It actually combines this week's focus, which is all about the details, as well as taking the plunge and sketching in front of other people. And guess what - as per the instructors, no one noticed.

The big takeaway for me though is how quickly the waiting time goes. I only had time to do the line work, first in lavender wc pencil and then ink. the bit of colour I put on was done from memory. It's not finished but I'm putting it aside because the point of the exercise was the act of doing it in the first place.

I also did a quick sketch while waiting for my car to undergo it's emissions testing and there again, the car was ready before the sketch was done. This time, the man across the waiting room as well as the guy behind the counter both were watching me but it didn't bother me at all. I haven't scanned it yet.

Another sketch I do want to post was done in pencil from the car while waiting for Kate's plane to get in. I had to shorten the wings to get them onto the page but I'm really happy with the perspective of the tail section.

Sketchbook Skool Week 5

Another week, another instructor and focus. Roz does a lot of animal sketching so is used to working with moving targets. To start us off though she had us sketching toys or figurines. Hmm, not a lot of toys around here and animal figurines have pretty much been decluttered over the years so what to do. Google of course!


So I went to a toy figurine website and picked out a hyena, a dinosaur (with a really tiny head but it was the angled scales I wanted to challenge myself with) and a stuffed but floppy moose.

These were gesture drawings done on smooth paper that does not accept water media so no colouring added which is too bad because it was also the colour of he dinosaur that drew me to him. He seems a little lacking here in cream and black because of that but I do like the moose and hyena. My hyena clearly is a good hunter though because his belly is a bit fuller than I intended now that I look at him here.

Virtual Paint Out - Kinmen Island Taiwan ROC

This month's Virtual Paint Out is set for Kinmen Island, part of a small archipelago of islands just off the southeast coast of China, near Taiwan.

The idea is you go to google maps and start looking around for someplace interesting to sketch. Once you've picked your spot you have to capture the link so the blog owner can verify the location.

This can take some time as it's literally as if you've plunked yourself down in the middle of this country to wander the streets at will LOL. Definitely a cheap way to travel and you can be there and back in an afternoon! Here's the link to the original location if you want to see where I was working.

My initial sketch was done with a lavender watercolour pencil to get shapes and proportions right. I then dropped in very loose watercolour and then added ink work with a water soluble pen. The challenge for me was to simplify what I was seeing and to capture the very specific roof lines of the building on the left. While not perfect, I was quite pleased with the results.

Now to see if I can figure out how to submit it to the VPO blog.