Category: Pen and Ink (page 1 of 2)

Broken Ankle Sketch

This morning I was looking at the sketch I did in the ambulance and began wondering how realistic or accurate a sketch has to be to capture a moment or describe an event.

Ambulance Sketch

The lines are shakey. My foot is barely recognizable. Most people would judge it a “bad” sketch. Yet, for me, it takes me there and I remember everything. The EMT who was riding with me was named Patrick. I remember what we talked about during the ride, how long it took, what the route was, that the siren was not on…everything, and I realized that the amount of realism in the sketch was irrelevant. A sketch is a diagram of an experience. There is a crossover to other senses and memory neurons when you draw and it works much like a certain smell or melody does to trigger feelings or memories.

So, today, instead of doing a carefully layed out drawing of my surroundings, I’m doing a quick pen sketch. The proportions are all wrong, the objects look wonky, and the lines look scratchy, but that’s the place and situation all right. There is my bag of pens and pencils, my medications, my sketchbook, my foot in a cast, my crutches, and all the surrounding mess that is our family room and a bit of the kitchen. When I look at it, I know that the lines look that way partially because my wrist and arms hurt so much from using those crutches and I know that the pain in that foot has kept me awake for two nights. That is the magic of sketching. It’s a process of observing through movement of the hand and arm. The extra time and effort it takes makes it much more potent than a photograph. At least for the artist.

Broken Ankle Photo

Jim

The Orchard

I’m starting to get the hang of this sketching stuff. My proportions are getting better and I’ve developed a process I like. I start by framing an area in my journal with blue tape, and then I lay out the scene using an orange erasable highlighter.

The Orchard – Layout

I divided the frame in half both vertically and horizontally and sketched in the major shapes in each quadrant. Then I drew the blackest blacks with a brush pen.

The Orchard – Brush Pen

Finally I added detail with an extra fine nib pen mainly drawing the darks rather than the contours.

The Orchard – Extra Fine Nib Pen

This is a small sketch – 5.5 x 3.5 inches. Here is what it looks like on the journal page.

The Orchard – Journal Page

I then used a hairdryer to heat up the drawing which erases the orange highlighter.

Jim

Eye Doctor Waiting Room

Drawing in the eye doctor’s waiting room. The place is crowded today. Lots of interesting faces. Some closer, some further away. Getting better with practice at capturing likeness and pose.

Stillman & Birn Zeta series spiral bound 5.5 x 8 notebook, Kaweco Sport fountain pen with extra fine nib, Noodler’s Bulletproof Black ink.

I also did one sketch on my iPod Touch just to compare.

iPod Touch People Practice

This was done using the ArtRage app. I was fighting the user interface. It’s hard to select colors and change brushes.

Jim

Buildings and Foliage

I did three small sketches today for Sketching Now Foundations online course by Liz Steel. This week 2 assignment is to draw buildings carefully first and then foliage with looser marks. The point is to compare careful vs looser ways of working.

I did these all in a small Moleskine Plain Journal 3.5 x 5.5 inches (9 x 14 cm). I used my small Kaweco Sport fountain pen with extra fine nib and Noodler’s Bulletproof Black ink. I wanted to travel light and carry everything in my shirt pocket.

I did the first two drawings at home. First I did the back of our house. Then I did the house across the street. Later we went out to the bank. I did the final drawing while waiting at the service desk.

Some days you’re hot. Some days you’re not. I just was not in the groove today. I did enjoy working with the Kaweco Sport pen. It feels very comfortable in my hand. The Moleskine journal is convenient to carry, but I prefer to work on larger, better paper. I did like combining both the analytical approach of drawing the building (angle, length, relationships) and the free form mark making of the foliage. A little play after a little work is good.

Pure line work looks very flat. It describes the shapes but not the volumes. I’m used to adding tones or colors to my drawings. These line sketches seem lacking and I’m not sure if it is just my expectations or if I need to work on something felt but not known.

Jim

Contour Drawing Practice

Today I worked on the week 2 assignment for the Sketching Now Foundations course offered online by Liz Steel. The assignment was to set up a still life with three objects – one with straight edges, one with curved edges, and one free form or textured.

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Contour Exercise

Today I’m working on an exercise for Sketching Now Foundations course by Liz Steel. Doing both blind and point to point contour drawings at different speeds. This week we are working on feeling edges. I’ve done blind contour drawing before, but I haven’t done point to point contour drawing.

I worked standing up. I usually work sitting down, but I read somewhere that it is better for your health to work standing up so I thought I’d give it a try. I placed my pad of paper on a tripod stand that I have for my iPad. It worked well. I had more freedom of movement and felt looser and more relaxed.

I started with a “30 Line” warmup. I guess I should explain that since it’s my own invention. I always draw better after warming up, but I realized this morning that I really have no idea which is better – drawing for a set time (say two minutes) or drawing a set number of lines (say 30 or 40). So today I’m trying a set number. I counted to myself as I made each mark. When I reached 30 I found I hadn’t finished the subject. So, I continued to 40. Okay, so I cheated. I’ll rename it next time. I think it helped. My first blind contour wasn’t half bad. It was fun doing a fast blind contour. Next time I’d like to use a fine tipped pen instead of a calligraphy pen just to compare the emotion of the line.

Point to point is a modified contour drawing and you don’t do it blind. You first place your pen on the page, pick a point in the subject and follow the edge of the subject with your eyes noting the shape, angles, and length. Next you follow with your eyes slowly back to the starting point. Finally you slowly trace the edge again with your eyes as you move the pen in sync with your eyes. You continue to do that point to point around the subject. It’s an interesting technique. The results are pretty accurate, but it takes a long time and requires a lot of concentration.

I did the fast point to point roughly two times faster. By this time I had drawn the same subject five times. So, I knew the shapes well. I felt comfortable working faster. The proportions suffered a little bit (the vertical lengths are off), but I like the feel of this last drawing. It doesn’t feel as stiff as the slow one.

Here’s a photo of my subject taken after I was finished drawing.

Contour Exercise Photo

At this point process is more important than subject.

Strathmore Bristle 300 series 11x 17 inches (27.9 x 43.2 cm) paper, green Sailor calligraphy pen with Noodler’s Bulletproof Black ink.

Jim

John

This is my friend John. The time was 1969. The place Berkeley, California. People were protesting in the streets and the Oakland police (we called them the Blue Meanies) were brutal. John showed up in this medic’s uniform of his own design sporting a WWII helmet, bag, and lab coat, and marched with the protesters in support and to offer aid when necessary. He put his own safety on the line to help others. All the people in my circle were like that – idealistic, courageous, and kind.

I drew this from a 35mm slide I took at the time outside my apartment building on Piedmont Avenue. 1969 was the year my draft status changed from student deferred to 1-A and it was the first year of the draft lottery. The Vietnam War was in full swing. My fate and those of my generation were determined not by the decisions of reasonable men, but by chance. I was lucky, but others I knew were not.

Stillman & Birn Zeta series 5.5. X 8 spiral bound notebook, Uni Pin 02 pen, Platinum brush pen, Inktense red watercolor pencil, Kuretake Petit waterbrush, and Lucas lamp black watercolor.

Jim

People Practice #5

I’ve been practicing sketching people now for a week. After doing 20 second and one minute sketches on and off all week I decided to slow down. I did these six figures in 18 minutes. I switched from using my usual Sailor Calligraphy pen to my Pentel 07 rollerball pen because it has water soluble ink and I could quickly add some grey tones by pulling color from the lines with a Kuretake Mini waterbrush.

It does help to practice. I’m getting better at seeing and drawing the shapes.

Jim

Front Room

I’m excited. This is my second try at using my new method of drawing and it really works! (Read my previous post for a complete description of the method and the theory behind it). The only change I made to the process was to take as much time as I needed to complete each stage. I didn’t limit myself to 20 seconds each.

I did this drawing without any preplanning or layout and with no preliminary pencil drawing. I started at the top and drew directly with pen all the horizontal lines I saw working my way down the page and out to the sides paying attention to the relative lengths of the lines and the distance between them. This first stage is very important because it determines the placement of the scene on the page and the proportions of the major shapes. It sounds difficult, but it feels very natural and easy to do without the need to do any measurement or make any corrections.

I next drew all the vertical lines working from left to right. I had to lengthen some of the horizontal lines to meet the verticals, but most of them lined up. Next I drew the diagonal lines and then the curves. I then added emphasis by going over and darkening the frames of the pictures and underneath the shelves. I then added the details of the books and other objects and the pictures. Finally I used my Kuretake Mini waterbrush to pull some grey tone from the existing lines. The ink of the Pentel 07 rollerball pen is water soluble.

Next I want to try different subjects. I’ll probably have to modify the order of the stages to accommodate subjects that have mainly diagonal lines or curves.

Jim

Line Sequence Sketch 1

Okay, I might be going down a blind alley or I may have made a great discovery. I’m not sure which yet. This is my first try at a new way of drawing. The idea hit me as I woke up the other day and it’s basically this. Instead of looking at a scene and drawing all the shapes, you instead progressively put down different kinds of line in a specified order. The order is taken from research about the developmental stages of drawing which found that children progress through making horizontal marks, then vertical, then diagonal, and then curvilinear marks. They then see and draw shapes, values and colors, and finally space. So, my idea was to first draw all the horizontal lines in the scene, then the vertical lines, then the diagonal lines, then the curves, and then to add some emphasis and finally some detail.

The other part of my idea was to use a method called Centering to turn off my inner critic and direct my nervous energy. I recently came across this idea in an article about how musicians are trained to overcome stage fright and use their nervous energy to enhance performance. Athletes also use the same method. So, I thought hey, why not artists. Here’s the link to the article in case you want to read the details. http://www.bulletproofmusician.com/how-to-make-performance-anxiety-an-asset-instead-of-a-liability/ .

My goal in combining these two methods was to do a very quick (2 minute) on-the-spot sketch. I would first center myself and then draw spending 20 seconds on each stage of the drawing. I knew I needed some kind of timer. So, I recorded my voice giving directions and timing cues while using a stopwatch. I would play this back while drawing. Here’s a link to my audio recording in case you want to try it for yourself.

I sat at the kitchen table and looked across the room at the stove and cabinets. I sat up straight and centered myself, picked up my pen, hit the play button on my iPad, and drew.

It was a very different experience. I wasn’t drawing things or shapes of things. I was concentrating on finding specific kinds of edges and drawing their relative positions and lengths, angles, and curves. In the last two steps I emphasized a few darks and for detail I added some hinges and handles. While drawing my inner critic was completely turned off. It’s as if he said “Oh, you’re just drawing horizontal lines? You don’t need me for that” and walked away.

20 seconds is a VERY short time to draw each stage. I admit that I was surprised to find that my drawing actually resembled my kitchen and I immediately wondered how it would compare to my usual way of quick sketching. So, I flipped my page over, set the stopwatch on my iPod Touch to 2 minutes, started it and drew until the timer beeped. I used my standard approach which is to start somewhere, draw a shape, and move outward drawing the surrounding shapes.

Standard Method Sketch

It’s interesting to compare the two images. The standard method produced a “wonkier” drawing. The horizontal and vertical lines weren’t straight and the proportions were off. The new method produced a drawing with a completely different character. It feels calmer, less frantic, more stable and assured.

Usually it takes me a while to warm up and get into the flow of drawing. My best sketches use three stages – a quick analytical sketch to figure out the subject, a pencil under drawing, and a final ink drawing. I’m hoping this new method will help me bypass all that to quickly achieve a better sketch in one pass. This first try is encouraging.

Next I want to try it with different subjects and without the time constraints.

Jim