Latest Portraits!

(see the cat?!)

These are the latest oil sketches I've done... all on Zoom with my awesome Portrait Pals. : ) I call them sketches because the poses are short and the panels are about 7x9". Sometimes I touch them up but often, I leave them alone. They are what they are! : )

Meat Free Mondays

I've been promoting Meat Free Mondays, sometimes called Meatless Mondays, on my social media. It's a popular slogan asking people to consider having vegetarian meals at least one day a week. I thought these cute sketches of cows, pigs and chickens would help spread the word!

Drawing the Bangarra Dancers!!!

 

 

I had an absolutely awesome time with the Toronto Urban Sketchers on Friday. We were invited to draw the Bangarra Dancers, from Australian, as they warmed up the morning of their performance. Then, some of us returned that evening for the actual performance, called "Spirit", which celebrated their 30 years as a dance company. 

I used charcoal pencil and newsprint and just drew as fast as I could! They did not stop moving. Their idea of an hour warm up was a work out like I've never seen. Truly spectacular dancers! Very inspiring. 

Lines!!

This portrait sketching exercise is about drawing fast, using as few lines as possible (I tried to stick to 20...) and using both the point and side of the pencil. I loved this process. I wish I did them on artist quality paper. They are on newsprint and I have yet to learn the lesson, always use good paper! ; )

some faces!

 

Prismacolor Coloured Pencil Portraits. Hmm... despite having fun with coloured pencils recently, they just aren't for me. They loose their point quickly because they are so soft (wax), unlike pencils (graphite). I gave it three chances and now I'm moving onto something else.

Also, they are very difficult to erase. Uh oh!

; )

Prismacolor Coloured Pencils

Some fellow artist and I from, the Toronto Plein-Air Group, met at the awesome Riverdale Farm to do some sketching. In order to take colour out of the equation and get back to basics, I decided to draw with Prismacolor Coloured Pencils on newsprint. 

 I used Sepia because it's a nice warm brown (although it's a bit hard to tell with my location photos). Newsprint is equally good and bad. It's soft so it's lovely to draw on. It 'takes' so many drawing media, like pencil, coloured pencil and charcoal, so nicely. But, it yellows over time since it isn't acid-free. Very  frustrating! So, I'm on the search for a paper than is smooth like newsprint and allows erasing as easily. I guess I'll have to go back to my favourite place... the art store. ; )

 Here's a detail. 

So great to be back out there plein-air drawing. I've only been twice this summer. That'll have to change!

Portrait Practise and... 8 years today!!

I spent this morning practising portraits with coloured pencil. A fun thing to be doing on the 8th anniversary of my blog!! 

Thank you all for the ongoing support and encouragement. I appreciate all your comments. Having a blog is a great way to working consistently, especially when the blog community is so inspiring. 

Cheers y'all ; )

musical trio

I had a fantabulous time sketching a musical trio at life drawing today. They practised, we sketched. It was a great experience, mostly because musicians take 'poses' that life models never do, so it was all new to us. 

There were three of them with five instruments. Violin, viola, flute, bassoon and piccolo. They switched seats every 20 minutes (playing musical chairs literally!) so we all had a good experience. I used charcoal pencil and watercolour, oh... and I had a blast! ; )

Pencil Portraits

I looooove to draw so, even when there isn't time to paint, I always find time to draw. These are 6B pencil studies from my sketchbooks. I use the Faber-Castell 9000 Jumbo pencils because they are so nice to hold, and kinda 'chunky' with some weight to them. ; )

Here's a pic -

sketching 100 people challenge continued

Well, not quite 100. And not quite a week, as the challenge was a 'work week' and ended today. 

thinking about design and line...

portraits of a dude

across the cafe and wearing plaid

The above sketches were drawn with Prismacolour Colour Pencils, mostly with Black Grape, which is an awesome colour. Very smooth pencil, especially on newsprint. And below, 6B pencil (my favourite). 

dog treats

making interesting shapes

These photos were taken with my iPadPro where they look great. It turns out, they don't look so good here... Hmm.

You can see even more of my sketches of people on my Instagram page! Check it out.