New Pen

  I have been wanting a nice fine line pen..I'm tired of drawing with fine markers, they always wear out too fast.  I got this Rotring Artpen today.    Sort of a calligraphy type pen,with an ink cartridge inside, and with a nice sharp fine line, instead of a chisel type end.   I wanted it to do pen and ink drawings with, and it works really nicely!! I loved it, until I decided to try watercoloring in my drawing, and the ink RAN!!!  I was so bummed out.    So, I re drew my drawing of my kitchen counter,  and left it just black and white.  Then I doodled a bit with it.  I really love how it works, but the fact that the ink will run and smear if it gets wet is a disappointment.  I remember drawing with my rapidograph pens and watercoloring them in.  I guess I thought this would work out the same.

ink drawing of my kitchen counter, smeared by watercolor.

I redrew my picture and left it alone.

...and Doodled for fun...

Cemetery Monument

I visited the cemetery today.  I wanted to draw some of the statues there.   I brought my sketch book, and sat in the car and sketched a bit, but I wasn't close enough  to what I wanted to draw. It's still very cold out with some snow on the ground, so instead of standing and drawing outside,  I got out and took pictures instead.  Then, at home I drew from the picture on the computer screen.  Drawing this was a lot more difficult than I thought it would be. I'm glad I'm taking the time to practice, it reveals to me the things I need to work on. 

7x10, pencil on toned paper with white conte to highlight.

Books and Lemon sketches, and Measuring

A few more sketches today with the conte pencil, and some nupastel for color on light brown paper.

I wanted to try a method for measuring the set up as I draw.   The usual way taught is to use a pencil or paint brush handle to sight your measurement of the subject, and then keep your finger on that spot, and transfer that distance to your drawing.  But, I always seem to have trouble doing that.   It's not very accurate.  My arm wobbles, and makes it hard to find a spot and keep it marked with my finger, and then laying the pencil flat to the paper while keeping my place with my finger just never works out for me. And then, if  I've measure the lemon in the set up, and figured out that the books width is 3 1/2 lemons worth, trying to keep that mark on my pencil and sight out 3 equal paces with it on my paper is always trouble.    What am I doing wrong?  Maybe it takes more practice??   I don't know, but I thought to make a thin ruler out of a peice of stiff paper. (I first tried a regular ruler, but it was too wide, and didn't have marks on both edges.)    It's easier to see where the marks on the ruler land on the set up, and easier to transfer to my paper.  No need to keep my finger in place to mark a spot.  It works as long as you want the drawing to be the same size as  your measurement. (although, you could add the same amount to each measurement to make your drawing bigger... Like, if something appears to be one inch, you could add 1/2 again, and transfer a measurement of 1 1/2 inches on your drawing, or a 1/4 inch with half added would be 3/8,  Or double each measurement for an even larger drawing )   I'll try this for a while and see how it works for me.   This cup always give me trouble though, no matter what I do.  It always comes out a bit wonky.  The ruler helped with checking distances of all the angles and edges of the books though. 

Story Books and Lemon

This is what I drew today.  I used a black conté pencil for the drawing, and then decided to color it in with some Prismacolor Nupastels.  The sketch book is a 7x10 inch Cachet Earthbound book with kraft colored paper.
I like this drawing, I think I might like to do a similar painting of it.

Drawing Today...

I have recently been reminded of how much I love to just simply draw the things around me.  It's fun to look  back through old sketch books  and see my own drawings of everyday things, it brings back memories of a certain time and place, and I rediscover things I had forgotten about.
I have different kinds of sketch books, and lots of different kinds of pencils and pens, and I'm always collecting more.  I like trying out different things.
I'd like to get back to drawing more often, and sketching everyday things... and taking my sketchbook with me to sketch things that I find interesting along the way.  And share them.   I want my "seeing skills" to get better, and it will be fun practicing.
I went to the library today, to take out the book, "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" by Betty Edwards.  I've read the original one before, and gone through a lot of the exercises.   This one is a newer edition, but looks like it has alot of the same information.  It's a very interesting book,  it explains the way your brain works while you are trying to draw what you are seeing, and ways to improve your perception skills. 

This is what I drew in my sketchbook at the library today...  I used a mechanical 2b pencil, and moleskin sketchbook.