Homework for Sketchbook Skool Week 4

It's not much to look at yet; as a matter of fact I had to really play with the contrast to get even this much to show up but I wanted to document the stages. This is the layout with the design elements sketched in in watercolour pencil. At this point my plan is to use a palette of red green and gold. Will see what I end up with.

Here's the intermediate stage-

 

I'm calling this done and submitting it to class. Once again the greens are less yellow in reality so yeah, picture that. The hardest part was leaving that white area on the front tomato and yet that's what I'm happiest with. Just goes to show I need to get out of my own way sometimes.

 



Mille Fleur Chickens

I'd been thinking of something to paint for Kate's birthday and thought a rendering of her mille fleur chicken Chrissy with her future chick would have a sort of whimsical touch. I do love how even the chicks have the feathered feet.

 

 

Sadly, things happen and the egg is no more, so I'll just have to think of something else to paint. I have an idea but am keeping it a secret for now. 

A Bit of Housecleaning

Colour. I just love colour. For some people it's shape and line that draws them first to a piece of art but for me it's always been value and colour. So while I knew I had collected a lot of different colours of paint over the years, even I was a bit taken aback when I made a list.

I'm in the process of setting up my own personal palette to include in my spiffy new sketchbag - custom made by Taylor Made Too Saddlery in black leather and blue-grey snakeskin no less! My paintbox will only accommodate 11 colours so I'm going to need to choose them wisely - hence the inventory.

I'm quite happy mixing my own colours so a basic sketch palette would include a warm and a cool colour of each of the 3 primaries plus some earth tones. Sounds straightforward.

I have 13 reds, 11 yellows, 8 greens, 6 browns, 10 blues, 3 violets and 7 miscellaneous tubes of paint. That's 58 different colours and I have to narrow that down to 11 to grab and go with. This may take awhile LOL.

Note to self: make sure your painting is fully dry before putting it on the scanner!

Week 3 Sketchbook Skool

Sketchbook paper is not watercolour paper so it was interesting to try and get a wash down smoothly. We were to tackle sky and water this week and I'm satisfied with what I ended up with. Yes, the darker blue wash is full of backruns but that was semi intentional to make the water look like the sea.

 

This is a street scene from Piran (Pirano) Slovenia provided by Google maps. Surprisingly to me anyway, the most difficult part of sketching this scene was that it was all on the right side of the paper. Not sure why that was other than I am right handed, but it did force me to really pay attention to scale in order to fit everything that I wanted into the sketch before running out of paper.

Once again the lighter colours have less depth on this scanned image than in reality. The building on the far right edge is a soft salmon-y orange hue in my sketchbook and the rocky shore here looks more like piles of shaving cream LOL. Can't worry about that.  

Two Posts in One Day

Sooo happy to be back working with watercolour and pen. I'm really liking this week's instructor- he's just one of those people you immediately warm up to. He was sitting on a rooftop garden in his hometown of Bangalore India filming this segment. You may have noticed people very rarely, like almost never show up in my work and yet today I found myself compelled to draw him as I was watching his video. So I did!

Prashant Miranda SBS1 week three

 

 

I may go back and warm up his skin tone a bit, it looks quite ashy now that I'm looking at it. And I just realized there aren't any shadows which would help with his white shirt. I'm just amazed at how much it actually looks like him. Maybe I should do people more often LOL. 

Coloured Pencils

This past week's instructor Koosje Koene prefers to work in coloured pencil so that was her focus, in addition to working outdoors. It's been ages since I've done anything in that medium and trust me, I won't be using it again anytime soon.

Turns out, my left brain is quite the know it all bully. When faced with the challenge of doing this new thing, he just bullied his way to the front and said come on, come on, get on with it already!

I found myself working with increasing frenzy, hardly looking at the flower (because Lefty insisted he knew what a flower looked like) and getting more and more frustrated with what was being put on the paper. Not a pleasant experience at all.

I also find no satisfaction in the slow build up of layers needed to achieve the colour depth. I have much new found respect for artists who choose to work in this medium but I'm glad we're returning to watercolour with the next lesson.

Oh and sketching in public is still on my to do list - there just wasn't time for it at lunch this week. Carol and I had way too much other fun stuff to catch up on.

Week 2 of Sketchbook Skool

The theme for this week was to work outdoors and in public. I've completed the first half of that challenge and will be working on the second half of it later today when I'm out for lunch with my painting buddy Carol.

This is the journal page that I'm submitting to class. It was done on a property southeast of here called Otter River Farms. Saw four baby raccoons that have been rescued, a cat and some chickens but no otters. Of course, I wasn't near the river.

I'm still getting used to the idea of adding text with the pictures - my penmanship has deteriorated so much in this digital age, but it is a lovely way to document the day. 

Next sketch is an old shed that was on the property. The original was all old wood and there were two bicycles leaning against the side. I liked the structure but the scene was quite dull so I opted to brighten things up and put a turquoise metal roof on it, left out a bicycle and added some potted flowers and a path.

That's what I like about a sketch - I can make it look however I want it to. I think this is the first time I've added/subtracted things from what I was seeing in real life.

When working from photographs, I usually select my subjects based on liking the whole aspect of the picture but in working from real life I somehow feel freer to change things up.

This all plays into the idea of creating my paintings rather than simply reproducing what is in front of me, something I see as the next step in my artwork.



This last sketch is the end result of one I did back at the end of June  and posted a few posts down. I did the linework onsite in pencil, then after making some adjustments to the perspective at home, I did the ink and watercolour. I've intentionally minimized the detail since simplifying is something I struggle with. In drawing, I need to work on seeing shapes first and adding in the detail later.

  

 



Family Room sketch

Fountain pen with watercolour
Aquabee Super Deluxe Heavyweight Paper Sketchbook 9 x 6

I'm really enjoying the sketching part - I actually find myself wanting to work bigger which is the opposite of my usual inclination. The journaling doesn't come as organically to me as of yet and partly that's because my handwriting has suffered in this digital age. I didn't want a big black blob in the middle of the page so journaling on the TV screen was a no brainer.

This is definitely a contender to be posted for the last part of this week's assignment. FYI - the red rectangle over there on the left is part of a lampshade. I ran out of room for the rest of the lamp!

Sketchbook Skool First Assignment

So many firsts with this one. First time using pen only to draw - no pencil. It's like working without a net. Definitely outside of my comfort zone but that is the point here. I tried to do this as a blind contour drawing but admit to having peeked to reorient myself.

One of the quotes from this klass was mistakes are lessons in disguise. Well, mine was a pretty significant one. Even when the manufacturer says the ink is waterproof test it for yourself first! I'd completed the drawing using a purple pen I found in my car - a uni-ball VISION fine waterproof/fadeproof. I then proceeded to generously wash the page with raw sienna only to have the ink run. At first, I was oh no, I'd have to start over. But then I kind of liked it and thought see what you can do with it.

And I even had the nerve to post it to the group, a promise I made myself when I signed up for this class.

Sketchbook Skool Week One

I'm halfway through the modules for week 1 and I'm really pleased with the course. Easy to access, straightforward presentation and very engaging. I had already purchased supplies, so homework assignment #1 is complete. Homework #2 is to actually do a sketch similar to what Danny demonstrated which I will save for later. Right now I want to post the completed sketch from Greece.

Watercolour and ink
8.5 x 11 inches Bienfang sketchbook

Again, the greens read quite a bit yellower here than in person. Not sure if it's my monitor or scanner. All in all, I'm quite pleased.