Short and Sweet Sketching

I watched a video today. It was a little different take on getting started with drawing. It was more focused on getting lots of volume of drawing and sketches done to start focusing on the physical training.



I drew a bird and some eyeglasses. Nothing remarkable, but I'm not looking for Picasso levels at this point.

In Honor of Rabbit

As soon as I thought of "organdising", I started thinking I needed to do an homage to Rabbit and his organdising ways.

I think this is the E.H. Shephard version:

I left out Tigger, but attempted my own version:

My Rabbit is a bit too chubby and needs a slightly different shape on the face.

I was pleased that there was no dilly-dallying. I just sat down to draw and produced it in short order.

It might have helped to think of the negative space as shapes to draw. I focused on the overall body shapes but could have done better at breaking down the space on the inside.

Organdise!

Amy has been getting her life in order (and sending subtle hints in my direction). I've watched at a distance as she has starting gaining control over the daily chaos through planning. Even from the outside, I can see that she has found something that is leading to better mental, physical, emotional time.

Last week she sent me a link to a video where a planner guru took a look at a planner sent to her...


I enjoyed watching her switch from "meh!" to "I have to try this out!" over the course of the video.

Amy bought a planner for me and it arrived today!

I'm looking forward to seeing how the transition goes to planner lady. Hopefully it results in more of a sane, focused me as opposed to a version of Rabbit "organdising". 

Sand and Shadows

I'm still working my way through the nature pictures I thought would be interesting to draw. I bit off a little more than I could chew today with a sand dollar that had both sand and shadows. Both seemed to call for the same shading technique, and I'm not convinced I pulled it off.

I did get to play with my paper stumps and tortillions, so that was a fun bonus.

Original picture:

My rendition: 

I did get at least some 3D feel to it, and there are definitely some different colors in the shadows. 

It's getting less stressful to sit down and draw. I'm starting to mentally break objects down into their component shapes.

Nature observation: it was interesting to see that the markings on the outside of the sand dollar were not perfectly symmetric. Apparently even nature needs to practice its drawing.

I Did a Thing!

Last week I decided I wanted to learn how to draw. After the rush of adrenaline from visiting the craft store and picking up supplies, I was confronted with the figurative and literal blank page. I did a short YouTube search and got the following advice:

• Draw every day for at least an hour.
• It doesn't matter what you draw initially; you're going to suck at it.
• Drawing is a physical activity that requires practice.
• Drawing anything. Draw everything. Draw what you see around you.

With those helpful bits of advice,  I set myself a goal to draw for at least one hour a day.

I was confronted and confounded by the pile of art supplies that I really don't know how to use.

Another quick YouTube search later:

• Start practicing your shapes.
• Try out all of your pencils. You'll figure out what you like.
• Try different ways of holding the pencils.
• Try to think about what direction the light is coming from for your object.

To stop procrastinating and actually get drawing, I started by drawing simple shapes: circle, square, triangle, rectangle using each pencil in my Prismacolor Premier Turquoise Art Pencils (12) set.

Once shapes started getting boring, I moved on to the "draw everything you see" step. I've been drawing dice as my drawing spot is in the same location as our Dungeons and Dragons equipment.

Yesterday I got adventurous and actually drew my dice tray complete with a d4. 

Emboldened by my success, I decided to plunge in the deep end today and start doing some drawings from pictures I've taken while traveling or hiking.

Here's a picture of a parrot from a park where we had a picnic lunch in Barcelona

Here's my first attempt at incorporating color into my sketches

I am absurdly pleased with the results. We'll see how I feel about him in a month or so, but right now, I did a thing and it didn't suck!