I was a pretty steady sketcher this summer. It was a good one — lots of camping and beach and swimming and other good summer stuff. Love having this record of some of our days.
Summer in sketches
Back to the daily
#unexpectedvalentines
Daily sketch No. 3
I was working at a coffee shop this morning, so I didn’t have ink and brushes with me, but I made my drawing anyway.
Daily sketch No. 2
Daily sketch challenge
I’ve decided to give myself a daily sketch challenge. I’d like to create a morning routine that kicks me right into creative work mode (instead of loafing around in social media land), so the plan is to make a sketch first thing when I enter my studio, before I even turn on my computer or check my phone. I’m tempted to post on instagram, but I think I’ll limit myself on that too. I might choose my favorites from the previous week on Mondays and post a couple as part of my new and improved ‘internet presence’ routine. But I will post them here, at least a few times a week — fair enough since more frequent blog posting is one of my goals this year.
The challenge paramaters (for now):
• materials: dip pen and ink, plus one additional color if I want it
• theme: kids and pets
• bonus: a hand lettered word or phrase relating to the image
Here is day 1:
Note: noodlers ink BLEEDS on watercolor paper.
Sneak peek
Here’s a glimpse of a project I’ve been working on for the past few weeks. These are a bunch of drafts of the color wash layer. Once I was happy with the color layer, I laid a sheet of translucent paper over the top and quickly made a graphite line drawing that roughly correlated to the wash below. After about a million drafts of both layers, I scanned and combined the color wash with the line art in Photoshop.
Done now — I’ll post final art when I get the go-ahead!
My new mantra
I plan to tattoo this on the back of my right hand, where I will see it every time I sit down at the computer to do something other than paint/draw/write. Hope to make it available soon as a print and a tote bag, because I have a feeling there are quite a few creative types out there who need the same reminder!
IF – Mask
Where have I been?
Well, friends, it has been a busy month. A vacation in March derailed my steady little blogging train, and my habits and routines have been all out of whack ever since. And then this past weekend was the Western Washington SCBWI Spring Conference, and I spent much of the prior two weeks preparing for it.
Here a couple of vacation sketches for your enjoyment. Just a little something to tide you over while I craft a longer post about the conference. Can you guess where we went?
