Category: Kuretake brush pen

Day482 Paris

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We should be touching down any minute in Paris. Can’t wait to get sketching in France. To stand in the haunts of some of my favorite painters Monet Degas Matisse Van Gogh and Cezanne will be amazing. To visit the Rouen cathedral that Monet painted how many times?! Got to paint it at least once. 

  

In the meantime going to post some of my Inktober sketches that I painted with the palettes I am taking with me. 

  
This one lit up my Instagram feed. And yes I did strip my kitchen floor. Evidently it also striped my fingernails even though I wore gloves but hey my floor looks brand new!! 

  
A quick brush pen sketch of one of the audience members at Best of Augusta. I just loved her look and couldn’t resist sketching her. Sometimes I find the audience members much more entertaining to draw than the bands that are playing. Her skin is burnt sienna with ultramarine blue for shadows. The hair is ultramarine blue and burnt umber. 

  
My dog Honey was painted with the Whiskey Painter palette only two colors. Ultramarine blue and burnt umber. Period. 

Thanks for reading. Pass me a croissant please!! 

Margaret xxx

 

Day 480 – one day till

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Lift off. My suitcase is packed and I have plenty of room for art supplies. When I went to key west I actually needed more sketchbooks. Not this time!! 

So why am I taking to sketch with?!! I know u r dying to know!!! 

  

 My two small palettes.  Been painting with them and they really have all the colors you need. The whiskey painters palette has all the basic Winsor Newton colors plus Daniel Smith Quin coral which I love for skin tones and two ceruleans because I use it A lot!!

The cotman is full of quinacridones and a couple of paints that should be in the Whiskey painters palette the yellow and Thalo blue. 
Paint brushes. Taking the good ones since I have room and just in case. Most of them are Isabey sables including the mops but the big sable is my cheap Joes legend which I love. Curious to see how much the Isabeys cost in France the land of their birth. They are made in Brittany and are Charles Reid’s  favorite brush. I wouldn’t mind another one or two. 

 

 Back up colors in case I run they the ones in the palettes. 

     

Pens loaded mostly with Platinum Carbon Black. Top to bottom Kuretake Brush Pen, Black pitt pen Fine, pentrl brush pen, sepia pitt pen Fine, two Noodler Konrads (one has Deartementis document brown ink in it) Platinum Carbon pen, and two of my favorite pens the Noodler Creaper  ahab.

   
I am taking these with me in case I want to paint as I sketch. I usually paint when I get home because I hate to make my sister Jan wait while I paint. Bad enough that she waits while I sketch. 

  Lots of ink and cartridges. 

 
Lots of paper. The two hand made sketchbooks have Cheap Joes Kilimanjaro, 3 strathmore mixed media sketchbooks(my current fav) a tablet of Fabriano squarely 149# cold press, some Canson post cards and some Strathmore 500 watercolor cards oh and a stack of accordion folded Stonehenge paper to draw strings of people and maybe a chicken or two on?! 

Thanks for reading. 

Margaret who is taking clothes I her suitcase and backpack too!! 

Day 479 Two days to Paris 😳

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Well at least we leave then. Lol. Be in Paris by 2 pm Thursday.  

Been raining cats and dogs do I am posting all of the family dogs but one today.

  A quick sketch of my lab Honey. She walked off before I finished it but decided to paint it this am. Painted with ultramarine blue and burnt umber.  
Grant – my sons newest put bull. Drawn with a Lamy Vista using Carbon Paltinum Black ink. 

Drawing a new dog is always a challenge. To top it off he’s black and white. I smeared the ink with my finger to try to make his black more solid. I actually drew him three times before I was happy with him. 

I wish I could give u some dog drawing tips but the only one I can give u is that a dog like a person or a horse is just geometric shapes. Check out Richard Schmidts wonderful Alla Prima book which is what he says about drawing anything. They are all just shapes.   

  

Livia my sons other pitty. Small sketch with a Kuretake brush pen loaded w Platinum Carbon Black ink. 

 

Lucy dog my youngest sons Briard Colie mix. Such a good puppy. 

  

My other dog Zoe watching me pack. Maybe I should stick her in the suitcase?! I have enough room. 

Thanks for reading. 

Margaret xxx

Day 478 – finishing up

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WIP???   Mermaid Lorelei and Mermaid McKenzie 11×14 super Aquabee tablet 

Not sure these are done but at least they have some color now. Getting into travel mode so I  used my travel Palette with Winsor Newton colors and my cotman palette with quinacridones. 

The background in this painting is cerulean and yellow ochre. I may darken with ultramarine or inathradone to make the mermaids pop. 

  
Remember this is what it looked like?

 

WIP – Mistress Princess Augusta – 11×14  drawn when I was done with one of the long mermaid poses. Her right arm still has problems. She was not posed so she was moving a lot and I drew her right arm too long. I shortened it with negative painting but now I think it is a smidge too narrow. 
TIP: Really love her skirt.  Both of these paintings were done wet on wet after watching a how to impressionistic watercolor video on Marcon Chews website http://www.marvinchew.com/ (You will have to scroll down for the video. Could not copy the exact irk for u! 😐) about wet on wet painting.The skirt turned out especially well I think. Done with ultramarine and burnt umber added to a wash of water that I painted on the skirt first. The background was done the same way. 

  

I added the bowler hat to the original sketch. 

Thanks for reading. 

Margaret xxx

Day 477 – last of Dr Sketchys 

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Happy Halloween!!  

The first three are all drawn with my Noodler Konrad and Lexinton Grey ink. The colors are all Winsor Newton watercolor markers a few tombows and Wink of Stella Glitter pens. 

  Mermaid Lorelei and Mermaid McKenzie. What librarians do when they are not working!! Wear mermaid costumes and makeup like a character from Avatar. 

My two favorite mermaid sketches. Thier costumes were awesome which is why I saved them for Halloween. This was a twenty minute pose that had ten minutes added to it.  

 I was done in twenty minutes so i started sketching Princess Augusta our hostess. 

  
Mermaid Lorelei and Mermaid McKenzie

Twenty minute sketch. If I ever sit down to watercolor these this one will be great. I barely had time to start painting.  

  

This was a ten minute sketch. I spent most of the time on the tail. Much more fun coloring than the human part. I really like the tail part but the human part not so much. 

  Mermaid Lorelei 

 Looking at that part of would be an easy fix. Shave a tad off the right side of her face and draw in her right upper arm. Oops the things u miss when unate drawing fast. The last one with the Kuretake brush pen. Sometimes I just draw better with one than the other. I changed to my Noodler Konrad. 

Day 463 more Best of Augusta #3

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  Once i switched to the Pentel brush pen life improved. Or maybe it was Bill Karp singing Frank Sinatra?! His 100th birthday. Frank’s not Bills!!!  
This is my favorite sketch of Bill. A good stance. Shoes look good and a good hand. Score!! 

I kept trying to draw Bills hand. He waved them around a lot. I. Perpetual motion. 
 

Finally a good hand though I made him a little fat. Oops sorry Bill!! 

Thanks for reading. 

Margaret xxx 

Day 458 – Zoe

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Zoe Pentel brush pen in Superaquabee tablet 

It’s not easy to draw an all white FLUFFY Jack Russel with black ink. Her fur is very wispy with a Mohawk down her back and bushy eyebrows. Impossible to draw those bushy white eyebrows with black ink. Zoe is a broken coat which means she has long hair AND short hair.  An extra challenge. 

Then there is her muzzle with black nose and lips and white hair with dots and a greyish cast. 😜 another inky challenge!! 
So I started shading which was done by smearing ink with my fingers before it dried completely. The ink is permanent so if you wait to long it won’t move on most paper. 

A redraw with my other non waterproof Pentel brush pens could be fun but we are off to the Magnolia cemetery ghost walk one of the most haunted spots in Augusta GA and the Hispanic festival. Hoping for lots of opportunities for sketching and photos for paintings!! And NO rain. 

Thanks for reading. 

Margaret xxx

Day 450 – Inktober

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 All I can say is WOW!!!!  450 days of consecutive daily blogging. And I didn’t think I would make thirty. 

 Jan  DAY 1

Noodler Konrad pen w carbon platinum black ink Super Aquabee tablet 

  Decided to really drove myself nuts and participate in Inktober. Aka posting an inksketch daily for the month of October. I tend to do art everyday anyway so it’s not a big stretch just to do ink sketches all month. Takes the pressure off doing watercolors too lol though I bet I end up painting some of them. 

  
Old Man at Panera Day 2 

Carbon platinum pen w carbon platinum black ink Super Aquabee tablet  

Not happy with this sketch. This guy was in his eighties. Lots of wrinkles. Eyes set deeply in his head. He was busy giving someone his power of attorney. The things you learn when you sit and quietly draw while people yammer on about their lives on their phones. 

 If I had taken a photo of him I would have redrawn him. Although the carbon platinum pen has a very fine point I don’t think it gives you the range of lines that the noodlers do. And it was hard to do any fine shading on his small face. 

  The Smoker Day 3 

Noodler Konrad pen w carbon platinum black ink Super Aquabee tablet 

What a character! A lot off wild waving of  her hands with a cigarette hanging out of her mouth, bright pink shirt orange overdyed black hair. I had to draw her. 

 Notes about drawing 

All my sketches are drawn from live people not pictures unlike my finished big watercolors which are usually drawn from photos. I think it gives the drawings more life. And people that know art can actually tell they are from real life as we say. 

Drawings are more successful if I lay down one line and don’t fiddle with it. Original line is usually the best. 

Been practicing life drawing almost daily for a year. 

Faces often easier to leave them out because that’s usually where I screw up a sketch like the old man.  The heads need to be fairly large to draw a good face. 

Start drawing from the shoulders and add the head- the attention getters.  Then the rest of the body. 

Favorite pens : 

My star pens are any Noodler pen.  I have several and love their flex nib. These were done with my Konrad because my big ahab is leaking. I am going to redo the rings in the ahab. It’s hard to beat because it holds loads of ink and is cheap at $23 at http://www.gouletpens.com

I am also fond of my Lamy Vista fine point and the Carbon Platinum pen. 

Brush Pens Pentel and Kuretake. The Kuretake is an elegant Japanese pen. And very reasonable at $20ish. 

INK hands down favorite is the ultra waterproof Carbon Platinum Black from Goulet pens.  DO NOT BUY IT FROM AMAZON. The ink there looks like goulets but runs like crazy. I use CPB in my Kuretake too. It’s the reason I bought the Kuretake. The Pentel is a great brush but sometimes the ink just is not waterproof. 
Other inks I like a lot are the super waterproof De artementis DOCUMENT brown and Noodlers Lexington Grey. Also from Goulet. 

I have a Bottle of Noodlers Eelskin which is supposed to be waterproof it isn’t for me. 

Smooth paper is a must for ink sketches. Favorites are superaquabee, Stonehenge or other Bristol and strathmore Mixed media 500 and Stillman and Birn Alpha. All but the S&B Alpha do well with watercolor too. 

Ok my chickadees that’s enough for today. Hope you haven’t caught this virus half the world seems to have in Augusta Ga. 

Thanks for reading. 

Margaret xxx

Day 442   Adam Harris Thompson Group Part 2

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  This is actually the first sketch of the group. I didn’t post because it was in the sketchbook which was in my car yesterday. And I was too tired to walk down stairs to the garage and get it. 

  I was really pleased with the two sketches of the group performing. They were drawn as they played and sang. And No they do not hold still. 

  At some point I changed to my beloved red noodler Konrad that had been loaded with a beautiful red ink. I had decided to change it to black but neglected to clean out the pen. The no waterproof red kept leaky as I painted these. Did NOT make me happy because I really liked these sketches. And did not like the red leaky ink. 

  
I have since rinsed it out with water and reloaded it with fresh clean Carbon platinum black ink.  AND tested it to see if it would run. Glad to over the runs are over. 

 I did find that adding yellow ochre to th Mix somewhat mitigated the red on the larger sketches but on the smaller ones in my Aquabee well sadly the red really bled. Thanks for reading.  

Margaret xxx