Tag: Art

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Berkeley Building Drawing Ink and watercolor wash Landscape Painting Places Sketchbook Pages Urban Sketchers

Crystal Amber Industrial Sand Factory and Railroad Buffs

Berkeley Cement Plant 1, ink & watercolor
Berkeley Cement Plant #1, ink & watercolor

This cement plant/sand factory takes up a square block of West Berkeley and offers a wealth of sketching opportunities. We were there as the sun was setting and everything was glowing for about 45 minutes and then suddenly it was too dark to see.

The factory’s site on Second and Virginia used to be a white sand beach (not the desolate industrial area it is now) and First Street (now Highway I-80) ran along the Bay.

Berkeley Cement Plant #2, ink & watercolor
Berkeley Cement Plant #2, ink & watercolor

In 1855 the Pioneer Starch and Grist Mill opened in the same spot but later burned down.  And that begs the question: what is grist?

While searching for more information about the factory I came across a railroad buff forum (Trainorders.com) where they describe watching trains deliver to the plant. I don’t understand most of their lingo but appreciate their enthusiasm for railroads:

One of my favorite memories was watching a flying switch drop at Crystal Amber back in the early 90’s. I used to bicycle from my house in North Berkeley to Aquatic Park next to the SP main.

The cab to cab SW1500’s were facing eastbound. They accelerated and then cut off the two hoppers, went into the pocket track and then the brakeman threw the switch. The other brakeman rode the two hoppers while the fireman flagged Virginia St. The switcher set then coupled back onto the hoppers, shoved past Cedar St and then pulled them down past Berkeley Ready Mix, then shoved them into Crystal Amber.

As the crew was walking back, I said to the brakeman “nice flying switch”. He was a bit surprised and replied “you liked my drop?”, to which I replied “Yeah, I liked your drop”. Ahh the memories.

Cement Plant at 2nd & Virginia, Berkeley; ink & watercolor
Cement Plant at 2nd & Virginia, Berkeley, journal spread; ink & watercolor

If you’d like to see more sketches of the factory by my sketch buddies they are on our Urban Sketchers Bay Area blog here.

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Drawing Ink and watercolor wash Landscape Life in general Outdoors/Landscape Painting Places Plein Air Sketchbook Pages Urban Sketchers

Pumping Something in Snow Park, Oakland

Pumping Something in Snow Park, ink & watercolor
Pumping Something in Snow Park, ink & watercolor

I don’t know what they were pumping out of the ground but the name on the truck—”Environliners”—made me think I probably wouldn’t want to know. It was a gorgeous summer day and I was determined to get outside for a few minutes at lunchtime. I spent it eating a take-out salad and sketching in Snow Park across the street from our building in Oakland.

Our office culture is to eat with co-workers in the office kitchen and get right back to work since there’s always more to do than hours in the day. We’ve even been trying to figure out how to add a new month to the calendar to fit it all in.  But some days you have to forget about all that and just enjoy the moment and the all-too-rare sunshine in the Bay Area this summer.

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Drawing Ink and watercolor wash People Sketchbook Pages Subway drawings Urban Sketchers

Subway Drawings: BART Riders

Shaky train, shaky pen; ink with digital coloring
Guns Before Butter; shaky pen & digital coloring

This lady carefully marked up her cheesy crime novel, “Guns Before Butter” with her pencil as she read.  The train ride was really bumpy and so my ink line got pretty squiggly. I switched to drawing her after a big guy with a bike got on and completely blocked my view of the man above her.

Two guys in green, ink & colored pencil
Two guys in green, ink & colored pencil

I experimented some more with the brown craft paper sketchbook, drawing with a black brush pen on BART and (above) adding white pen and colored pencil at home.

More Brown Paper People
More Brown Paper People

And below, some ink drawings done on BART with watercolor added at home later.

Waiting patiently, ink & watercolor
Waiting patiently, ink & watercolor
Elderly Asian couple, ink & watercolor
Elderly Asian couple, ink & watercolor
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Berkeley Drawing Ink and watercolor wash Landscape Life in general Outdoors/Landscape Painting People Sketchbook Pages Urban Sketchers

Sketching at the Berkeley Pier

Fishing & Strolling the Pier, ink & watercolor
Fishing & Strolling Berkeley Pier at Sunset, ink & watercolor

It was the hottest August day in the history of San Francisco, smack in the middle of the coldest summer since 1975. So for our Tuesday night sketch-out we headed for the cooling breezes coming in off the Pacific Ocean through the Golden Gate Bridge (in the center of the picture above, to the right of the San Francisco skyline). We weren’t alone. The pier was full of people strolling and fishing and enjoying the rare warm evening.

Men's Bathroom on the Pier at Sunset, ink & watercolor
Men's Bathroom on the Pier at Sunset, ink & watercolor

Although my sketch buddies selected a more scenic perspective from the same vantage point (which you can see on our Urban Sketchers Bay Area blog here), the men’s bathroom and shoreline rocks glowing pink and orange in the sunset attracted me instead. Apparently I was holding my sketchbook at a strange angle as I was drawing and painting (or else the world temporarily tilted) causing the wonky slanted horizon and bridge.

The sky turned indigo blue as we walked back down the pier towards land, and a huge full moon rose over the hills. Then a group of half a dozen kayakers with little headlights on their boats paddled right under the pier and out the other side below us. It is special sights like this that make getting out in the world to sketch so special.

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Art theory Flower Art Ink and watercolor wash Painting Sketchbook Pages Watercolor

Matalija Poppies (Fried Egg Flower)

Matalija Poppy, Watercolor 9x12"
Matalija Poppy, Watercolor 9x12"

Today in the my watercolor class I demonstrated painting white flowers and soft-focus bright or dark backgrounds. A neighbor graciously allowed me to pick a huge bouquet of Matalija poppies from her gigantic bush so each artist had their own flower to paint.

To save time I only painted a quarter of the flower before going on to paint the background. This made it a little difficult to finish the painting after the class since by then the flower had completely changed so I just pretended a little.

To paint the background I started by making three different puddles in little bowls: Permanent Alizarin Crimson, Quinacridone Gold and Winsor (phthalo) Blue. I used a separate brush for each color to keep the colors clean. Then I just worked my way around, washing on little gold, a patch of red beside it, a splotch of blue, letting the colors touch and mingle.

Matalija Poppy Sketch, green ink & watercolor
Matalija Poppy Sketch, green brush pen & watercolor

To warm up for today’s demo I did this sketch last night using my fun new green Pitt Artists Brush Pen and then added watercolor. And I spelled the flower name wrong. Which I’ve been doing forever, or at least since I painted the first one several years ago found on my website here.

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Albany Building Drawing Ink and watercolor wash Landscape Outdoors/Landscape Painting Places Plein Air Sketchbook Pages Urban Sketchers

Cool News (Urban Sketchers) and Albany Hill Sketch

Peet's Coffee El Cerrito and Albany Hill, ink & watercolor
Peet's Coffee El Cerrito and Albany Hill, ink & watercolor

Our Tuesday night sketch group is now an official Urban Sketchers group, known as Urban Sketchers SF Bay Area. If you’d like to visit our Urban Sketchers blog, you’ll get to  meet my fellow Bay Area sketchers and see the different ways we interpret scenes in our sketchbooks, often from the same viewpoint.

The sketch above was done while sitting on the steps of the Pier One across from Peet’s in El Cerrito. It was the first sunny day in ages and it felt so good to enjoy a latte and some sketching in the sun. Albany Hill sticks up right behind Peet’s. It’s an odd bit of geography that resembles a very tall cupcake (sprinkled with trees instead of jimmies) in an otherwise flat landscape.

Albany Hill’s “Dynamite” History

In the late 19th century, the Judson Powder Works used the hill for the manufacture of dynamite. The company was forced to move from San Francisco and then Berkeley because of continuing accidental explosions. They planted the eucalyptus trees on the hill to catch debris and muffle the sound of their explosions. The stop on the transcontinental railroad tracks just to the west was called Nobel Station, after the inventor of dynamite.

Continue reading “Cool News (Urban Sketchers) and Albany Hill Sketch”
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Art supplies Berkeley Book review Building Drawing Ink and watercolor wash People Places Shop windows Sketchbook Pages

Mrs. Dalloway’s Bookstore: Mockingjay District 12 Window Display

District 12 at Mrs. Dalloway's Bookstore, Ink & watercolor
District 12 at Mrs. Dalloway's Bookstore, Ink & watercolor

Since I’d read, and surprisingly enjoyed, The Hunger Games, Suzanne Collins’ first book in her dystopian futuristic trilogy, I understood why this display was in the Mrs. Dalloway’s Bookstore window: it was advertising the third book in the series, Mockingjay.

The Hunger Games trilogy is about a boy and a girl struggling to survive an annual contest where teenagers from 12 impoverished districts are forced to fight for their lives in the ultimate televised reality show, with the winner bringing honor to her district. When a reliable friend recommended this young adult novel, I was highly skeptical on so many levels. But I found it to be a good read (or listen really–I borrowed the book on CD from the library).

Goorin Hats, Berkeley
Goorin Hats, Berkeley

Before sketching Mrs. Dalloways, this little brown craft-paper sketchbook from the UC Davis college bookstore (a gift from my friend Pete Scully) was perfect for warm-up sketches with a brush pen. College Avenue is full of interesting, upscale little shops like this hat shop.

This previous sketch of Mrs. Dalloway’s is one of my favorites. It’s a wonderful bookstore with a special focus on books about gardens.

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Art supplies Landscape Oil Painting Outdoors/Landscape Painting Places

Early Morning at Kaiser Garden, Oil Painting

Early Morning Garden, oil on canvas, 20x16"
Early Morning at Kaiser Garden, oil on canvas, 20x16"

I think I’ve finished this painting (but then I thought that several times before). The last time I thought I was finished, I looked back at the notes I’d written opposite my journal sketch about what interested me in the scene and my goals for the painting. I saw I’d missed a point or two and worked on it some more.

Now I’d really appreciate some honest feedback:

Do you think it’s finished or does it still need something, and if so, what do you suggest to improve it?

This was painted with Holbein Aqua Duo water-soluble oil paints. It’s such a joy to oil paint without odor, to thin paint to a wash without solvents, and to mix water instead of turpentine with the Duo linseed oil to make painting medium. The pigment quality, drying time and consistency is identical to regular oils.

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Drawing Faces Ink and watercolor wash Life in general Painting People Photos Self Portrait Sketchbook Pages

Self-Portrait and My Lady Gaga Makeover

Self Portrait with Sketchbooks and Tea, ink & watercolor
Self Portrait with Sketchbooks and Tea, ink & watercolor

When I set up my old mirror to sketch the self-portrait I end each journal with, I could see my sketchbooks on the shelf behind me in the mirror, along with the cup of tea behind the mirror.  When I finished the sketch I pasted this photo of my Lady Gaga Makeover on the opposite page:

Me with Lady Gaga Hair
Me with Lady Gaga Hair

I found Instyle’s Hollywood Makeover website when I was looking for new hairstyle ideas. You upload a photo of your face, line it up, and select a hairstyle (from a huge collection of celebrity photos) which then appears on your face. I haven’t laughed so hard in a long time!

Once you select a hairstyle (and even change the hair color) you can choose face and eye makeup, creating a complete makeover, which I did. If you register on their site you can save and download your makeover photos and it’s all free.

Jennifer Garner Hair Makeover
Jennifer Garner Hair Makeover

I brought this more reasonable makeover photo to my hairdresser, who rolled her eyes since the original model (Jennifer Garner) has thick, straight hair and mine isn’t. But with the help of her scissors and blow dryer, I did get something close.

Of course now my hair has gone native again, back to curly, since that’s so much easier than trying to turn it into something it isn’t with gels and blow driers and clips and pins and staying out of the wind and fog.

If you try the makeover site, please share the results! Or at least enjoy the laugh!

Categories
Drawing Life in general Places Sketchbook Pages

Where Did the Day Go?

Where did the day go? Ink & watercolor pencil
Where did the day go? Ink & watercolor pencil

Does this ever happen to you? You start off the morning feeling optimistic about everything you’ll get done today and then suddenly it’s evening and the To-Do list has only grown? Not only the day flew by, but given the date on this sketch, so has a week or two.

I sketched this sign while sipping an afternoon latte at Peet’s Coffee. Two women at the next table seemed so intrigued by my watercolor pencils and water brush that I said, “Here, try it!” and let them color and paint (on their napkins).

I’ve been so busy with working, teaching watercolor, and squeezing in a little time for painting and sketching that I’ve gotten behind on posting. But my number one priority today is finishing binding a new journal as I’m down to the last two pages in my current one and they’re reserved for my end-of-sketchbook self portraits.