Categories
Cartoon art Illustration Friday

Illustration Friday: Clear

Clear
Drawn in pencil, scanned, inked & colored in Painter digitally
(To enlarge, click image, select “All Sizes”)

After a few weeks of being too busy to participate in Illustration Friday, I’m excited that I was able to play again. The topic is “Clear” and I had several ideas: the plastic replicas of a man and woman whose internal organs are visible through their clear plastic “skin” that I had as a kid, a clearcut forest, a bottle of liquid with sediment that is settling until the liquid is clear, a woman with a clear mind and a not-clear mind, but I when I started doodling around with this one, clear (the table) it was the most fun to draw so that’s the one I picked.

Half way through, Painter did another one of its bloop–magic–everything is now gray, too bad–tricks. One minute everything was fine, everything but the line drawing was completely gray and I couldn’t figure out how to fix it. Finally I tried opening a new file and copying and pasting the two layers I needed into it and it worked. Painter is the most unstable program I’ve used in many years. At least I’ve learned to save every couple minutes. If it wasn’t so late I’d go in and clean up some fuzzy edges but it’s good enough and I’m off to bed.

Categories
Outdoors/Landscape Plein Air Sketchbook Pages Watercolor

Painting Palms in the Dark

Painting Palms in the Dark

Ink and watercolor in large Moleskine watercolor notebook
(To enlarge, click image and select “All Sizes”)

The other night Michael and I were driving down Santa Fe Ave near Gilman in Berkeley and he pointed out these two palm trees that were lit up and glowing in the dark. Tonight I returned to paint them in the dark from the front seat of my car. I couldn’t exactly see what I was doing or what colors I was getting. The light in my car was fairly dim and my paper looked brownish instead of white. I was excited to get home and see it under the light, where it looks completely different. I’m really starting to enjoy letting things just happen with my art instead of trying to control it so much. That’s a wall  covered with ivy in front of some small trees in front of the palms, in case you can’t tell.

I’ve been noticing palm trees lately and wondering….why do they exist? Why did they evolve to be so tall and skinny, with the leaves/fronds and fruit up so high up?

Categories
Still Life Watercolor

Persimmon in Spoon Holder

Persimmon

Ink & Watercolor in Large Moleskine Watercolor Notebook
(To enlarge, click image, select “All Sizes”)

It felt like time to get back to some color tonight and this persimmon was a willing victim for a quick little study.

I stopped at the art store on the way home from work tonight and ended up spending too long (and too much money), gathering oil painting supplies and learning from a knowledgeable employee about improvements in oil painting materials since I last used them 20 years ago, and how to work with the new safer mediums and solvents–no more turpentine. I remember being in an oil painting class at SF City College in a room without special ventilation, with 30 students all having open containers of turpentine and paint thinner. By the end of class I’d feel like I was drunk–just one of the many reasons I seem to have so few functioning brain cells these days, I’m sure!

It felt weird buying white paint, since in watercolor one tries to save the white of the paper for areas that are to remain white. With oils you can add a highlight or a light area at the end of the painting, which rarely is successful with watercolor, unless you don’t mind opaque paint on top of a transparent watercolor.

My plan is to try to use the oils like watercolors, glazing in layers. I’m certainly not planning to give up watercolor, but every now and then there’s something I’m painting that seems to want to be more opaque and have greater depth.

Categories
Drawing Sketchbook Pages

Compassion on Election Eve

Compassion

Sepia Ink (Memory Brush Pen) in Raffine Sketchbook

I was listening to the early election returns while I was drawing this little statue of Kwan Yin or Kanzeon, the Buddhist bodhisattva (saint/goddess) of compassion for self and others. It seemed an appropriate image for election eve.

I received my order today from Jerry’s Artarama and I’m not happy with it. The box of 10 mat boards was supposed to be white Strathmore Museum Board that I can no longer get around here, but instead is a box of random off-white mat boards in mediocre condition, with fingerprints, dents or tears.  I drew this with what looked in the catalogue like a brush pen but is really a floppy-tipped felt pen–not terrible, but not great. The Liquin oil painting medium that was supposed to be a good substitute for turpentine smells worse than turps. I’d also ordered a whole bunch of aluminum frame kits which still haven’t arrived. I hope they be in better shape than the mat board, which I now have to deal with returning.

Categories
Animals Drawing Sketchbook Pages

New Kittie Tree: Great Customer Service

Ink in Raffine sketchbook
To enlarge, click image, select “All Sizes”

About a year and a half ago I bought a used kitty play structure for my new rescue kittens. Then they both came down with ringworm (probably from the shelter), which is very contagious and very hard to cure. I had to throw away everything they’d touched (including their play structure) that couldn’t be severely bleached. I had to isolate them for about three months, give them serious medicine that had to be specially compounded, bathe them in nasty smelling stuff, bleach every surface in the house they’d touched and every day vacuum and bleach every surface in their two rooms (spare bedroom/exercise room and bath). I had to wash my clothes after each visit to them in their isolation rooms. It was really sad having new kittens locked up like that so I spent as much time with them as I could. Finally they were declared cured and could return to the rest of the house.

I searched for another kitty tree like the one they loved. Nobody carried it around here anymore so I ordered it online about a year ago. Even though it was made by the same company, Green Duck, it wasn’t quite as sturdy as the original. A couple weeks ago I realized the top shelf was slipping and spinning on it’s pole and when the kitties jumped up on it, it kept swinging around and hitting the window. The whole top shelf was starting to tilt downhill and I could tell it would eventually fall off. I called the online merchant I bought it from and they said that Green Duck was no longer doing business with them; they said to call Green Duck directly.

Green Duck apologized and said they’d send me another one the next day (no questions asked about price, purchase date, shipping the behemoth, etc.). They were no longer making the original one so we selected this one as a replacement (and an upgrade) and it arrived two days later. This was the best customer service I’ve experienced in a very long time. They’re a great company and stand behind their products. As you can see from the drawing, Busby approves. I haven’t figured out what to do with the old one yet so I feel like a crazy cat woman now, with two kitty trees. (as if I wasn’t before!)

Categories
Colored pencil art Drawing Monoprint Still Life

Monoprint experiment

Monoprint Lantern

Black water-based printing ink & colored pencils on Stonehenge paper, 7×9 inches
(To enlarge, click image, select “all sizes”)

Today I experimented with making monoprints, having been inspired by Belinda del Pesco‘s amazing monoprints, and Kris Shank’s woodcuts. This is the same candle lantern I drew and posted a couple days ago. I’ve drawn it so many times now — for each monoprint you have to do the drawing again. I think some of the others were better drawn but this one was dry and I could add color, so its the one that gets posted.

I’d never made monoprints before and didn’t know anything about how to make them so I read a few articles on the internet and then went to the art store. I bought both water-based and oil-based printing ink and a brayer to roll it out with and some print-making paper. I tried lots of different approaches and had a good time learning what works and what doesn’t. My usual way of learning things is quite different: read lots of books, research all the details, make sure I have all the right equipment and supplies and know what I’m doing before I do it. This time I just experimented, letting it be an adventure, saying “let’s see what happens if…” I made many interesting mistakes and a bit of a mess but since I wasn’t too attached to the outcome it was a great day.

There’s several approaches to doing monoprints and the one I liked best was to apply the ink on a sheet of acrylic and then sort of carve away and push around the ink using various implements, none designed for that purpose (stumps, rubber clay tool, coffee stirrer, paintbrush handle). Once I had the drawing done, I put a sheet of paper on top of the plastic and used my rolling pin to press the paper and ink together. The water-based ink dried fairly quickly on the paper so I was able to add colored pencil to it this evening. I tried applying watercolor but it melted the ink. I think I’ll be able to add watercolor to the oil-based prints once they’re dry. I made half a dozen prints. Two were complete flops and the rest were not bad for a first try.

I also bought a couple of linoleum blocks and carving tools so I’m going to try that next. Then it’s back to watercolor — I have several paintings just begging to be painted.

Categories
Animals Photos Sketchbook Pages

Photos from my world

My tall shadow

Hi, welcome to my tall world. This is a picture of me taking a picture of my shadow. I am so easily amused…I guess that’s why I enjoy my own company so much.

Today was a long and busy day and now I’m too tired to draw so I thought I’d post some photos I’ve shot in the past week or so.

Brilliant web

A lovely spider and her sparkly web.

Plump Spider

A nice plump spider building her web–not quite so well organized as Spider Number One.

Neighbor's Garden

A neighbor’s garden.

Alcatraz

Alcatraz as viewed from the sailboat, er…yacht last weekend.

And now it’s off to get some rest. Tomorrow I’m hoping will be a fun day of drawing, painting, and experimenting with monoprints.

Categories
Other Art Blogs I Read Plants Sketchbook Pages Watercolor

Just a Value Sketch (Persimmon)

Persimon-value sketch

Above: Watercolor in Raffine sketchbook

Below: Original photo and grayscale version
Persimmon photo persimmon-grayscale

(Click images to enlarge, select “All Sizes”)

I was inspired to focus on value studies by Katherine Tyrrell’s post about “the best ever workshop” she attended and her instructor’s “constant and particular emphasis on the huge importance of values when painting light.” For tomorrow’s watercolor class I’m going to ask my students to do some value studies and wanted to have one prepared in advance so that’s what my post is about today.

Value studies can be so helpful not just for figuring out the values that actually exist in the reference material, but also for deciding how to change the image before painting it. It gives you a chance to consider where values need to be different to help the composition and for that matter, how does the composition need to change to be more successful?

It seemed to me that my original photo, while bright and colorful didn’t have much of a range of values so I tried to increase the contrast by adding stronger darks when I did the value study. Then I converted the original photo to grayscale to compare to my 0ainted version. I think somewhere in between the two might be best. I scanned the pencil drawing before painting it, so it will be easy to print it again and paint it again, if I decide to.
I’ve found that students usually grumble about having to do value studies–it seems too much like eating enough fiber or flossing teeth. I guess value studies just don’t seem that sexy (I hate it when people use the word sexy to describe things having nothing to do with sex like cellphones, cars, and now painting…but somehow that word works here…though now I’ve probably now increased my spam by using it…) in the way bright wet-in-wet washes or painting glass or thunderclouds are. But there’s nothing that captures light in a painting more than really nailing the values and getting those darks and lights in there.

I took this picture today when I was taking a nice walk in the Berkeley hills with my sister just after it had rained. It was supposed to rain all day today and I was all set for a cozy day at home in the rain but instead it was hot and sunny….in November?

Categories
Drawing Sketchbook Pages Still Life

Lantern in the dark for Daddy

Lantern

UniBall Signo white pen on 9×12″ top sheet from an Arches watercolor block
(To enlarge, click on image and select “All Sizes”)

On the fifth anniversary of my father’s death, I drew this candle lantern that was given to me by my son. I’m going to light the candle now and spend some time reflecting on my father’s life. Lighting a candle to mourn a loved one on the anniversary of their death is part of the Jewish tradition known as Yahrzeit and there are special candles that burn for 24 hours for that purpose. Since my father was both Jewish and an artist, I think it’s OK that I’m commemorating his passing with a drawing and a tea candle in a little lantern instead. I remember my grandmother lighting these little candles for her family members who had passed and thinking them full of mystery.

As part of Yahrzeit, the mourner is supposed to recite the Kaddish or “Mourner’s Prayer.” In reading about this (since I know so little of the Jewish religion) I found this excerpt from the last line of the prayer that I liked:

May He who makes peace in high places make peace for us  and for all…

(To comment go back to top of this post)

Categories
Drawing Other Art Blogs I Read People Sketchbook Pages Subway drawings

Subway Drawings (BART)

Subway Drawing - BART 7

Ink in Moleskine (click image, select All Sizes to enlarge) 

He was sitting two seats up from me this morning and his profile was irresistible. He was a perfect model for the whole 13 minute ride. When I got off he gave me a knowing look. He couldn’t see me drawing him (the seat between us hid my notebook on my lap) so maybe he thought the times he caught me looking at him were because I found him irresistible.

Bart-Susie
Ink in Moleskine (click image, select All Sizes to enlarge)

The drawings above (Susie) and below (Sharon) were done last Thursday night on BART when we were returning from the art show in San Francisco. Neither of the pictures capture their likenesses though they do capture something of them.

Bart-Sharon

Ink in Moleskine (click image, select All Sizes to enlarge)