Day 315 of my almost year long odyssey

May 21, 2015Leave a comment

I drew Rhineharts the other day while waiting for friends. Rhineharts motto is beyond casual and it lives up to that. It’s one of Augustas favorite restaurants and is a higgily piggily old house that has been added on to over the last thirty years. The floors are concrete, you sit at picnic benches, oyster shells cover the pine shaded parking lot. Both the picnic tables and walls are covered with names inscribed with magic markers. I added ours with my Noodler Creaper Ahab. If you’re lucky a cat will beg for your shrimp tails.

The drawing had problems. The building is very long and hard to fit on the double page spread. The bits and pieces that jut out here and there make it a perspective nightmare or maybe it’s that nothing in this place is level or square. A builders nightmare!!

Fun making all the greys out of various blues and Browns. Dashes here and there. Of the two colors and greys everywhere. Like the sparkle of the turquoise and the three cooks hanging out in the back porch SmOkiNg done with their lunch shift.

Thanks for reading.

Margaret XXX

Day 307 Reportage?! Part 2

May 11, 20151 Comment

Love these new Isabey and Richeson squirrel mops that I got during my class with Fealing Lin. Not cheap but love the soft loose look of the paint you get with them. She paints all her landscapes with them.
Been busily painting the sketches I did during Pops under the Stars Saturday. This is Brad Means warming up the audience at Lady Antebellum Amphitheater in Evans Towne center.

I sketched in the audience as they headed to get snack or a better seat. There was a lot of movement. People standing and sitting down yakking with their friends. Sipping wine. Some people dressed to the nines. Others wore jeans and tees. I am sure there was some champagne in the crowds song with bud lite!

Gesture sketch of the orchestra warming up. The violinist was serious.

Lee Anne enjoying the calm while Drew chased the perpetual motion machine Henry.

Henry’s first concert. Every now and then he took off like a rocket with one of his parents racing to catch him. The child has a career as a future star sprinter. Get ready Decatur High School.

Tomorrow more Pops Under the Stars. I only drew about 30 fast sketches and half an accordion book.

Thanks for reading.

Margaret XXX

Day 306 -Reportage?!

May 10, 20152 Comments

Happy Mothers Day.

Last nite we went to the annual Pops under the Stars with the Augusta Symphony. I drew about thirty pages and half an accordion book. It was a lot of fun and felt like I really was in the groove. Pages of sketches of the conductor. They are so energetic. Just wish we were closer to see Maestro Z better.

So here is part of what I drew. Can’t wait to slap some paint on these.

Sketching the orchestra warming up!!

Maestro Z

The conductor was very energetic!!

Sketching the orchestra warming up and some of the crowd.

More Sketching the orchestra warming up

Henry loved it. His first fireworks and he thought they were amazing.

One of my favorite sketches. Lee Anne.
The crowd nearby.

More later. Gotta run. Mothers Day company coming!!
Thanks for reading!!

Margaret XXX

Day 295 – Get Your Inner Jackson Pollock On!!

April 29, 20152 Comments

When I ran across one of my favorite card ever the BMW Z 3 in. The Kroger parking lot I knew I had to draw one more car. I have always convetted this car. And they were made up the road from me in Greer SC. This is painted in my Stillman and Birn Zeta Staedler pen watercolor and gel pen. Bytw the gel pen hates this paper. Very odd.

Chose yellow for the background because they are complimentary colors.

Car #1

This is my friend Marsha’s 1995 Corvette also known as Baby. I drew her three times. Twice before I got her right and a third time just for fun on ledger paper.

Car #1 is obviously awful but I did find the ledger paper interesting so I fluster it again.

I have a whole book of ledger paper. Not one of the old gorgeous books that Lapin loves but one from the 70s I think. Does that make it vintage?!

I have used the paper quite a bit in mixed media and it always gives a fun effect so I thought I would try the corvette on it. After all she’s vintage too.

Car #3

The paper wrinkles. Strike 1. I thought about mounting it on a piece of illo board and I still might. Hopefully that would flatten it out. It also did not allow for the watercolor to be bright. The colors are more delicate on ledger paper an effect that I do like. So will I paint some more on ledger paper. More than likely especially if I can find someone to cut the book in half. It’s a tall narrow book. The other problem with it was that it will take forever to fill it. It’s 252 pages long!!

I did find that the gel pen loved this paper. No idea why but it would go on like butter. It’s not so fond of watercolor papers.

Car #2

This is painted in my Stillman and Birn Zeta. My second attempt. It still has a few problems. The left bumper is off. It should be square and her read end is too long which is why I drew it the third time.

Splattering. Be sure to cover your car when you do the background. Mix up soupy cerulean and yellow ochre and sling it at the paper. Get your inner Jackson Pollock on. So much fun to splatter paint. Just know that it will go everywhere including your phone your ipad and you!

Go forth and look for vintage cars. They are not Ez to find.

Day 293 – So many sketches

April 27, 2015April 27, 20152 Comments

which should I post?! I have been painting up a storm the last few days and I keep drawing more to paint. Sooner or later I will get them all posted.

I drew the Locks at Savannah Rapida last Thursday when I was at the Savannah Rapids park for The Newcomers Lunch and a talk by the head of the Savannah River Keeper (http://www.savannahriverkeeper.org https://www.facebook.com/savannahriverkeeper) who does her best to keep the Savannah from being the most polluted river in the country instead of the fifth like it is now.

Glad I live above the pollution but both Augusta and Columbia County drink from the pollution as well as dump their waste in it so we can drink it. 😜 The things you learn at lunch.

Drawn in my Stillman and Birn Zeta with my Noodler Creaper Ahab and Carbon Black Ink. Colors. Well just about everything on my pallette but the yellow.

This was painted from background to foreground a cobalt sky and trees painted at one go.

Trees. The greens are yellow ochre or sap green mixed with viridian.

Same mix for the water with more cerulean. But the water was added LAST! Don’t forget to leave the whites. Hard to do!

Greys are mixed with burnt sienna or burnt umber and ultramarine blue. Rust is burnt sienna but you knew that.

Rocks I added yellow ochre to the grey mix.

The locks were painted right before the water.

Gel pen for hand rails. White gouache seemed like too much work!

Thanks for looking.

Day 292- Inner Bean

April 26, 2015April 26, 20154 Comments

I love go sit in the inner bean and sketch the diners but I have never drawn it from this angle before. I say in the middle of the place drawing and nobody noticed me. They were all too busy with their conversations.

There were all kinds of coffee things to draw from this angle. So many cups!!!

I started by drawing the bar and as people filtered in I added them to the scene. Biggest problem is the counter is so high you can’t see the moms and their worker bees fixing coffee and sandwiches and cutting the delicious cakes.

For some strange reason a lot of people were wearing black. It’s spring and it was Friday. Where are the bright colors?! I actually changed some of the black shirts to other colors or it would have been deathly dull.

Noodler creaper Ahab loaded with carbon platinum black in my Stillman and Birn Zeta.

Colors used. Flesh DS Quin Coral and Yellow Ochre

The black – Indigo and Ultramarine Blue With burnt umber added now and then.

Orange or red hair is actually the Quin Coral with yellow added to it.

Otherwise most of the colors were straight off my pallette with little mixing.

Thanks for looking!

Day 292 – Inner Bean

April 26, 20152 Comments

There were all kinds of coffee things to draw from this angle. So many cups!!!

Noodler creaper Ahab loaded with carbon platinum black in my Stillman and Birn Zeta.

Colors used. Flesh DS Quin Coral and Yellow Ochre

The black – Indigo and Ultramarine Blue With burnt umber added now and then.

Orange or red hair is actually the Quin Coral with yellow added to it.

Otherwise most of the colors were straight off my pallette with little mixing.

Thanks for looking!

Day 290 – A Special!

April 24, 20152 Comments

Only ten more days to go til I have posted 300 days in a row. Who would have thought I would get this far. Not me!
You all know I like to draw my lunch breakfast dinner desert. I like to draw food especially if it’s colorful.

The inner bean special
So today I drew my lunch. The inner bean special which I highly recommend. A boarshead turkey blt topped with their homemade ranch dressing on oatmeal bread with a spring green salad and balsamic dressing. Yum I even liked the purple onion and ranch dressing – two things I normally don’t eat.

Drawn in my stillman and Birn Zeta with my Noodler Creaper Ahab with Carbon platinum black Ink. The Noodler flex nib pens are such fun because you can get such a great variety of line with them. They are inexpensive and my favorite pen.

About the painting.

Colors used. Every color on my pallette except viridian and phthalo green.

The sand which was done by brushing it first with a mix of pale yellow ochre and raw Sienna with a tiny bit of indigo. I let it dry and sponged it with a darker version of the same mix at least twice. The edge of the bread is burnt sienna burnt umber and ultramarine blue.

First I washed the salad with a pale green made with sap green and a bit of cobalt. I let that dry and mixed the same colors making a darker green. Last I added cobalt and ultramarine for the dark shadows.

The red in the salad is vermilion. The darker red are done by adding cobalt to the mix.

The walnuts are the same colors as the bread starting light and going darker with each wash adding ultramarine and burnt umber at the last to make the lights pop.

Salad dressing is vermilion with bits of cobalt.

Tea is burnt sienna cobalt and a bit of vermilion to make the purples.

Napkin – burnt sienna and cerulean. One of my favorite greys.

The darkest greys and blacks are made with indigo and burnt umber sometimes with a dash of vermilion.

Vermilion also makes a great purple onion.

I did most of the shadowing with burnt umber and ultramarine blue.

TIP: Shadows are important. The dark shadows serve to make the lights pop.

Can you see where I went back in and added the darker colors in this painting. I think it looks a lot better now. What do you think?

Thanks for looking!

Day 286 Another Accordion Book

April 19, 2015April 20, 20152 Comments

Sennelier USK journal book.

Kuretake brush pen till it ran out. Then my Pentel brush pen. It was colored with Tombow markers and watercolor and flesh Winsor newton gouache.

TIP: The flesh gouache makes painting skin tones easy! No mixing so no fuss.

This one has been completed since earlier this week. I was saving it for the weekend to post.

Most of it was drawn at the local walking track or dog park.

The stroller was amazingly easy to draw with a brush pen. A few stokes zip zip and done.

The last half was drawn while patting in my car in the Earthfare parking lot starting with the lady in the black and white dress.

Earthfare

The entire strip. About 36″ long. Nice heavy paper. You could draw on the back but you would not have a lot of paper length which is part of what makes these books fun.

Thanks for looking!!

Day 273 -The last post of my Bayeux Tapestry

April 5, 2015April 5, 201511 Comments

something new tomorrow.

I thought that my Bayeux Tapestry would fit in this tv cabinet which is huge. NOPE. The TV is a 50″ one. I mean the book is only 210 inches. Just shy of six feet. But I think it looks cool there anyway.

Sennelier Urban Sketch Accordion with heavy paper.

I found a temporary replacement at Binders. A nice heavy Sennelier accordion book but it’s only about a yard long. Not quite the impact of the long moleskine. However that paper is much better. Heavy nice paper. You could draw on both sides I think with no problem.

Bytw I also found out that Moleskine has outsourced all their books to China. The not so great paper is really terrible now. I won’t be buying more. I am going to bind one.

How hard can an accordion book be!? I got some light weight BFK Rives paper, some Stonehenge and some of Binders brand like Stonehenge to give a whirl too. Exited but will have to wait till I get home because I don’t have all the tools here to do it with. Hence the purchase of the Sennelier book.

In the meantime here is a closeup of all the panels. Promise last post of the moleskine. Done with Pentel brush pen, colored Pitt brush pens, tombows, flesh watercolor and flesh gouache.