Some sketches done from life instead of photos.

[GreenPartyVoter]

Had hubby drop me off so I could find something that I could do as a quick sketch. Settled on this gorgeous tree in front of a B&B. He turned up early and I felt like a game show contestant racing to get all the prizes. LOL I know he wasn't drumming his fingers on the steering wheel, but I still felt like it. Accuracy went right out the window.

Long story still long, I'm just not loving water brushes, and I would have done this sketch differently with more time or from the photo at home. I don't feel I caught the feeling of the place or the awesome quirkiness of the tree. But, I did it all on the spot, wind blowing everything away. 😛 So, yay me!

Barncastle. Blue Hill, ME. Strathmore MM journal, Micron pen, mostly DS paints

[LiberalLoner]

1. Nice!

[mopinko]

2. the thing about life v photo

tho both lead to a 2d thing, w life you are sucking it all in in 3 dimensions.
to the extent that making art is about feeding a brain, that is clearly just better.
anyone feels like they do this for therapy should care less about how that 2d thing turns out and more about what went into it.

going from a photo does make it easier, but that shouldnt be the point.

[Pobeka]

3. Looks good to me!

I was learning to sketch with pen many years ago, and we were on a ferry leaving harbor and I spotted an interesting old building so I started sketching, not factoring how fast the ferry moved -- I quickly realized I only had under a minute, and the view constantly changed.

What made it really stressful -- my daughter was in architect school at the time doing a lot of sketching, and she was yelling at me "FASTER Dad, FASTER!!". Still makes me laugh now to think about it.

Yours turned out pretty good I'd say.

[lunatica]

4. Quick sketches are extremely valuable

In both of these you used completely different methods. Your tree shows you were very loose and quick in both the ink drawing and the laying down of paint, and it shows that you wanted to catch a feeling of landscape, not too defined, like a quick study. I really like that you included the speed limit sign which gives it a location beside a street. And I like that your tree dominates the picture. The way you painted the upper branches which are bare feels like the tree is reaching up to the sky. Your quick layout gives the picture an exciting immediacy. A depiction of wild nature.

In contrast the bay window sketch is much more detailed and controlled in that you are depicting your delightful and unique way of drawing and painting architectural lines. The lines are freehand, and giving much more detail to all the rectangles in the painting. Your use of pen and ink really stands out because you don’t cover them with washes of paint, so the result is a very clear and airy drawing enhanced by the painted details. Both the ink outlines and the color washes and strikes work together in a complimentary way, balancing each other really well. The overall feeling is light and air and sunlight flooding in crisply defining each object. I really like that the ink lines and shapes are defined separately and of equal importance to your splashes of colors. This mixture of different mediums done in freehand is really appealing to me. I especially like how you use the drawing technique.

[GreenPartyVoter]

5. Since I am a control freak, the tree sketch was harder in the sense of letting go, and the window

was hard because I wanted to keep perfecting everything. I have a hard time remembering that I am capturing ideas and feelings, not photographs. I do still feel a bit sad about not capturing the tree’s form more closely, as it was the strong stark lines in its form that caught my eye. What I did is a lovely tree and very free and wild, and I am proud of that, but I will be glad when my accuracy improves so that I can be free and wild without having to think about everything. Just go on autopilot and slap down some lines and just the right color mixes by intuition, which I think is really deeply ingrained knowledge and skill.

My window isn’t photo perfect, but it’s feeling perfect. It think it tells people how nice it is to sit on my couch with my tea or coffee and enjoy whatever I see out there. I think I will redo it a few times this year, to capture the seasons and wildlife. Deer are frequent visitors. Once we had a barred owl, and another time a young bear.

I love old children’s books, so it’s no surprise that I gravitate to line and wash, especially in small pieces. But I differ in that I generally use my color for shading instead of my pen. A more modern approach, maybe? All I know is it suits me well, and I love it all the more since the pen work comes from my Dad and watercolor from my Mom. I find it both surprising and comforting to see their styles coming out of my hand, even though they have been gone for so long.