Starting Out on a Banner

Now this is my first banner. Oh boy. Here I go. But I HAVE to get this done like right away and get it in to the Mt. Dora Chamber of Commerce by Nov 23 because we are going north for the Thanksgiving holiday.

I have been assigned the Plant and Garden Fair.

First I had to gesso both sides of the banner. You can see my starting that last week. I did both sides and then hung it outside to dry.

The banner is pretty big. The first sketch is pretty small (but I hope in proportion). I laid it on the banner so you can see what size I am starting with. I will now try out some color and values in the sketch. This is the front of the banner and the most important side but I will have to do both sides obviously. I am thinking I'll repeat the printing on the back. But I have to see how long it takes me to transfer this sketch onto the banner and get it painted before I decide how detailed I have time to be on the back side.

Wish me luck...I seem to have a VERY busy week so I don't know how I am going to get this done!!!

Step Two

So then I get out some tracing paper...and I am not following Donna's steps quite as she does...but then we are all different, right? I took tracing paper and put over my sketch and I began to trace over it using a soft sketch pen (brush type). Now I begin to look more at the shapes than the objects and leave out and add some things. I try to think about the negative shapes, repeating patterns, and where light and dark might connect. I am not much looking at the reference photo at this point.

Step One

Okay...so this is how it is going to go.

I have just finished watching Donna Zagotta's DVD called The You Factor. She works in OPAQUE watercolor (gouache). And at the same time I fell in love with some photos Deb Ward posted in a quilt store. (See her Oct 25 post.). Aren't they cool. She gave me her permission to use the photos as a starting point and I have actually combined several to make a new drawing (of course). So. First I made this rough sketch about the same size as the painting I planned to do later. As Donna suggests I tried to look at the setting more as an abstract group of shapes than as an actual picture I was drawing. (Does that make sense?) This is just a pencil sketch on scrap paper.

The Lone Cypress

This 250+ year old Monterey Cypress is a real show stopper!  And I've been told since it is a symbol of the Pebble Beach area that you are not allowed to sell images of it without permission!  Not that I plan to, but that is interesting.  This was also part of the 17 mile drive that we took last week in California.  Cotman Field Kit and .005 Micron permanent pen.  

Illustrating a Cookbook

My next project is to put together a family cookbook for a wedding gift for my nephew (Sept 5 in Santa Cruz, CA).  7 of us in the family are contributing 4-10 recipes each with photos if possible and if not I am going to watercolor/ink in some of the illustrations.  This is NOT a very good example but I thought I'd give you the "idea".  You can copy these by the way...feel free.  :-)  In some of the entries I have included a photo of great grandma Nell with her recipe or I might have a photo of someone actually eating whatever it is I am making.  In some cases I photo the actual ingredients or paint them (see the chili sauce painting from an early post).  Just thought I'd mention it as it makes a great Christmas present and you need to start ahead of time for such a thing.

I have given some thought to having it actually printed up in a book...you can have that done online now.  But I don't think I'm going to be able to get it done in time to have it for this wedding.  But another time.  I think this one will be a looseleaf notebook.  If I have some more interesting illustrations I may include them at another time.

Happy Fourth of July!

Happy Fourth of July Everyone!  Hope your holiday is as much fun as our!  We have 4 of our 9 grandsons up to the cabin with us for the whole week.  WOW.  Gives meaning to my sketch yesterday afternoon down at the lakeshore of the waterbottles (4 kids and my hubby). 

I am playing here with water soluble graphite and  and aqua brush and well as my Cotman watercolor travel kit.  My hubbie is getting the boat ready to launch (it's about time) but it's been so cold up here in the northwoods that we really haven't had the incentive to want to be out on the water very much.  Gradually it is warming back up.  So there is hope for some tubing and fishing.  The boys have all been swimming (even though the water temp hovers around 70 which is too cold yet for me!)  

We are headed off to Minoqua this afternoon for the parade, the band concert in the park and a big picnic on the blanket there.  Then the ski show and the fireworks.  We all sleep well when the grandkids are around!  Have a great day.  

Journaling even on a rainy day

There is never a day when practice in your journal won't be beneficial to you.  No matter what medium or papers you choose. No matter than rain forces you to journal inside.  In my classes I encourage botanicals and still lifes as a way of sharpening your sense of awareness and perception.  The examples here are a way of looking at one subject with a variety of different tools.  While watercolor is my chosen medium, I do feel that it gives one a wonderful sense of working with "value" when you work in one tone.  

The tools used here are ebony sketching pencil, water based ink (I used a black Tombow pen), watercolor (Winsor-Newton), water-soluble graphite (made by General), watercolor pencil (Derwent), and watercolor with ink (here I used permanent ink a .005 Micron which is my old standby).  Except for the Ebony sketching pencil one, I used water and a brush in doing all the others.  All of these would look different if I chose a different grade or finish of paper.  I'll talk about journals themselves and paper another time.

Getting materials for sketching and journaling

As I begin to prepare materials for the watercolor journaling class in September...I am going to encourage folks interested in this topic to consider some materials that might not have tried before in journaling.  

Besides the more traditional watercolor/pencil/ink which is wonderful and fun.  I like to trade off from time to time using small sketches with different water media...water-soluble pens, watercolor pencils and watercolor crayons.  I also love water-soluble graphite!  Yes, they make pencils that are usable with water too.  I'll write more about them later. 

Pictured here (blue-green colored in the middle of the picture)  also is a "water brush".  When using these slightly different media, I've found a water brush is really a fun and easy tool to use.  The barrel of the brush fills with water and you simple press lightly to wet the brush.  (no need to carry around a water jar or dipping your brushes!)  There are several brands.  The one I have is called Niji Waterbrush and I got it out of Cheap Joe's catalog.  But I see that ASW Art Supply Warehouse had them on sale in their summer flier (until the end of July).  It is a brand called Aquastroke and you get 4 brushes for $8.73 (shipping is $5.95 no matter how small or large your order is).  The code # for this item is 41-3739. If you are interested.  I'll be demonstrating the aqua pens at the workshop on September 16...click on "sketching" on the labels section of the blog and more info on that should come up.  

ASW also has Derwent watercolor pencils on sale 12 pencils for $10.00.  #08-0389.  Now finding the water-soluable pens is more of a hunt.  I don't recommend a whole set.  Just black and maybe a burnt sienna.  Tombow Pens are THE best.  Sometimes you can find them sold separately at stores that sell stamping supplies.  You can google Tombow pens and find many place that sell them (I like the dual tip ones) and they are not expensive.  It's just the shipping costs that are prohibitive!  Check out the pen sections of stores like Staples and Office Depot and see what they might have in "water based pens" and experiment.  

The book by Brenda Swenson that I have shown is the one I recommend for my students in journaling and sketching.  Michaels has it for $10 and I think Cheap Joes has it for about $7.00 if you are placing an order there anyway.  Again...shipping is the issue.  It's really a terrific little book for the money! 

The value of a thumbnail sketch....

I was really privileged to take a class from Lynne Ferris this past winter. What a splendid watercolor artist she is!  She winters in Florida as I do and was willing to teach a few workshops at the Leesburg Center for the Arts. 

One of her practice lessons included working a figures with lots of light and shadow in them and a lot of chance to look at negative space.

I found this photo of my 12 year grandson, Nate, jumping off our pier last summer.  (Have you ever seen more joyful abandon?)  

      You can see that Lynne asked us to try out some small thumbnail sketches first changing the negative space from light to dark first to see which would facilitate the whole painting best.  I chose the light background this time.  

     Getting in the habit of thumbnails is not easy.  But it really does help to solve a lot of the compositional issues before you start the painting.  I ended up throwing some salt and splattering below the figure to sort of give the idea of the splashing even though he actually hadn't yet hit the water.  Artistic license.  

Take a look at Lynne's website by clicking on her name above as she is worth looking at if you don't know her work.