The Weekly Sketch ~ Themed Drawing Prompts For Members

[snowbear]

Nice one snowbear. It's great to see that someone managed to find some time to do some sketching. I'm finally home from the Christmas / New Year family chaos, so hopefully tomorrow or Monday I'll be able to pick up a pen and some crumpled paper.

TBH, I knocked mine out this morning but I thought it wasn't due until tomorrow - I lost a week, somehow,

 

 

First "crumpled paper" was a fail. ....thinking.....

Any particular issue? Sometimes graph paper is a little easier to sketch because you have the lines to use as a guide.

[Pira]

Themes: January 2016

 

January 3 - 9

 

#9 ~ Your hand

 

January 10 - 16

 

#10 ~ a small pile of yarn or string

 

January 17 - 23

 

#11 ~ an egg carton

 

January 24 - 30

 

#12 ~ a pair of socks (feet optional)

 

January 31 - February 6

 

#13 ~ an open book/magazine/journal

[snowbear]

Themes: January 2016

 

January 3 - 9

 

#9 ~ Your hand

 

January 10 - 16

 

#10 ~ a small pile of yarn or string

 

January 17 - 23

 

#11 ~ an egg carton

 

January 24 - 30

 

#12 ~ a pair of socks (feet optional)

 

January 31 - February 6

 

#13 ~ an open book/magazine/journal

 

These could be interesting.

[Pira]

HAPPY NEW YEAR you crazy sketchers! Hope you all had a nice time doing fun things or just kicking back and doing not much of anything with those you love (human or otherwise).

 

Sorry for being AWOL, but that is December for me. A crazy mad rush up to the 23rd then I pretty much drop off the internet grid until the new year. My object is to be 'present' for my family.

 

I gave up on even trying to draw during the month but I am glad to see that others at least gave it the college try. Good on you!!

 

Inkfillet ~ I LOVE those onions! They were a big part of my month of cooking OH how I envy that lovely pen holder! And yes....we all need a bit of a 12 step program when it comes to pens...and ink...and nibs. Love the NEW YEAR cabbage

 

Snowbear ~ Hubby realized on the 23rd that he'd forgotten to purchase his wife a gift so I had to quickly scrounge up a vintage pen online & print up the order so he could slip that in an envelope to give me on Christmas Eve at my parents. I was off to my parents farm where I'd already sent ahead the meat I'd smoked (hamhocks) and assorted foods I'd made ahead of time (cabbage rolls, saurkraut....which I soured myself, etc) and had to prep the rest of dinner with my mother before the family arrived (and so help me if they'd nibbled a single dessert I'd packed in their cars there was going to be bloodshed) & settled in for the festivities.

 

Re the 3 pack of ink ~ #1 son is a wise boy. My #2 daughter got me a gift certificate to a bricks & mortar pen shop for my birthday in Dec. We raised them well.

 

Crumpled paper...I will owe that one. I've had my model on my desk collecting dust. You did a great job with it. ...I'm such a little stinker. I set the theme for the challenge value and bail....Yup...I do owe you this one because you rose to the challenge over the holidays! *salutes you*

 

Milkb0at ~ great keys! Very relaxed feel to your lines I generally get too relaxed when having a dram to attempt to draw even a single line. OMGoodness you lucky duck. Homemade mince pie *drools* I'd have eaten it too fast and would have to draw only crumbs....

 

Sailor Kenshin ~ It's the effort that counts! I couldn't even muster that...too pooped from all the baking....then eating. And we will not ask my liver what it thinks of the holiday season, but suffice it to say that it's best that I didn't try to draw a thing.

 

LuMA ~ you don't have to sweat 'catching-up' with the sketches if you don't want to. Jump on and off the wagon anywhere you want and as many times as you wish. It's all in fun for when you are inspired and no one is keeping track

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ o0o ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

I want to thank everyone who has participated in this weekly theme thread and I hope you have enjoyed the process as well as the chatting. Don't forget that you can send me your ideas for future sketches. Keep in mind this is sketching of things on a small scale (a.k.a. it fits on your desk)....I'm lucky to be able to see anything beyond my nose when wearing my drawing glasses.

 

On that note ~ I look forward to seeing what you ladies and gentlemen coax from your pens this year. Lets get DRAWING!

Edited January 3, 2016 by Pira

[amberleadavis]

Pira, I'd love it if you could make some of your tree (not the leaves) sketches available for us to play with. Maybe a downloadable jpg? I'd be glad to pay a royalty.

[Pira]

Pira, I'd love it if you could make some of your tree (not the leaves) sketches available for us to play with. Maybe a downloadable jpg? I'd be glad to pay a royalty.

 

You might need to expand that throught....not entirely sure what you mean.

[amberleadavis]

So, you do the tree first with a black ink, and then later, you do the leaves as a wash with a different color right?

 

I think you should scan some of the trees (sans leaves) and see how us non-artists do making our own Pira Trees.

[Pira]

Nope.

 

I) Draw the outline of tree with pencil ~ leaving space where the ink wash will go

 

2) Apply the ink wash and wait for it to dry

 

3) Fill in the black ink details of the tree ...wait for all of this to dry then erase the pencil lines

 

It would be madness to draw all that black (this really is what takes the longest amount of time) only to mess up the ink wash.

 

Step by step here: https://www.flickr.com/photos/57069742@N00/albums/72157651419806606

[amberleadavis]

Pira, that's beautiful. You should post a thread on just how you do that.

 

Alas, I can tell you, that I am not capable of doing that tree. Did you see my bottle of ketsup? I think your work is stunning. For that matter, I think you should sell them.

[Pira]

Thank-you

 

This all came about because I got bored testing out the inks via writing or doing little swatches...besides, I wanted to practice drawing. And trust me..I have had a lot of practice this past year... https://www.pinterest.com/cobaltdragon1/arboretum-inkadelica/

 

WHICH brings me to a point; that ....all it takes is practice, practice and more practice of drawing that which you really enjoy. Trees are nice. But there is a world of options you can cast around for. The reason I do TREES is that like writing sentances it's consistent. Same method. Same paper. Same tools. It's a manner in which to compare them like you would simple swatches...except I intentionally break the colours.

 

I do intend to start printing cards of a selection of them...setting up a little etsy shop to see how it goes. Last year was pure play...this year I want to push forward a bit and see what happens.

[amberleadavis]

They are wonderful.

[Sailor Kenshin]

They are wonderful.

 

 

Ditto!

 

PS: Heyyyyyy! I used to have that dish!

Edited January 4, 2016 by Sailor Kenshin

[Tas]

 

I do intend to start printing cards of a selection of them...setting up a little etsy shop to see how it goes. Last year was pure play...this year I want to push forward a bit and see what happens.

 

Can't wait !

 

Massive fan.

[milkb0at]

I agree that Pira's ink trees are great.

 

Here's my Week #8, crumpled paper.

 

By golly that was tricky. I wish I had chosen a smaller piece of paper! At first you think you can be cheeky and make up some folds and creases, but you quickly realise that keeping track of your lies among the real shadows and tones would be more difficult. Even when doing it correctly, keeping track of what goes where was difficult. So this is approximately what the actual paper looked like, give or take a mistake or three.

 

It's a bit of a mess! I tried reducing the myriad tones down to three, but it hasn't really worked. So there are some dark splodges, not enough bright areas and a load of muddy lines denoting mid tone. I need to figure out how an expert would do it without painstaking days of tiny marks or dots. I also think I should have used a dip pen, allowing hairlines and different weights of lines to differentiate between an outline and a tone line.

 

I never seem to get the scan setting the same each time, so this has come out much yellower than reality.

 

Usual method applies:

- Rough pencil outline. I considered shading or marking in some of the key tones in pencil, but it was already too complicated so I just went with the pen quite early.

- Platinum Carbon Pen & ink

- Moleskine Pocket Sketchbook

[snowbear]

Pira: I love the trees. I might have to do something similar for my ink reference cards (like a bear in a sweater). I just do a brush swipe, now.

 

milkb0at: nice job. I'm certainly no expert but I'd be tempted to use layered washes for the midtones and leave the crosshatching for the darks. It would change the character of the drawing, though. I think you could also vary the distance between the diagonal shade lines - further for lights, closer for darks.

[ThyPenMaker]

Pira: I love the trees. I might have to do something similar for my ink reference cards (like a bear in a sweater). I just do a brush swipe, now.

 

 

Why the sweater at all? Just a bear with a ghastly expression "Look what they do to me!" sort of thing and paint the fur. Maybe standing with an arm over his eyes, don't want to look.

Edited January 6, 2016 by Inkfillet

[snowbear]

Why the sweater at all? Just a bear with a ghastly expression "Look what they do to me!" sort of thing and paint the fur. Maybe standing with an arm over his eyes, don't want to look.

Too much like the Grateful Dead dancing bears. I had a school project which required drawing the same object 96 times. I chose one of my smaller inexpensive polar bear figurines. I ended the assignment drawing (him) with different ice hockey team jerseys. I figure this would be something like that.

[Luma]

@snowbear: Do the Coca Cola bear but change the bottle to be whatever ink you are using.

[snowbear]

@snowbear: Do the Coca Cola bear but change the bottle to be whatever ink you are using.

I wouldn't draw the Coke bear, specifically (trademarks and stuff) but I like this idea. I'll play with it and see what I can come up with.

 

I made a practice sketch of my hand today - it will need a little work but It will probably include a pen or be petting a kitty.

[Pira]

Why the sweater at all? Just a bear with a ghastly expression "Look what they do to me!" sort of thing and paint the fur. Maybe standing with an arm over his eyes, don't want to look.

 

The thing is...whatever snowbear decides to use ~ if it is for the purpose of an ink swatch, it needs to be something one is willing to draw with a consistency of method that can then be used for comparison purposes....without it becoming a chore. Doing a wash shirt then filling in the bear around it would serve that purpose. The black of the outline of the bear would provide a nice contrast to the colour of the shirt with a wink and a nod. I tried drawing all the trees in the colour of the ink, but that takes twice as long to draw & I don't think it looked as good as black trunk & colour foiliage.... in order to fit the bill of colour swatches. Also ...and this was equally important to me, the entire process was an exercise to practice drawing fine lines and think about the structure of trees.

 

Keep in mind I like trees a lot. If I didn't ...drawing them would be a painfully dull waste of hours each day. I drew over 116 trees last year....minimum time spent on each was 2 hours. Full colour was longer...

 

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/57069742@N00/15999075805/in/album-72157639593794726/

 

 

snowbear ~ My advice is don't over think it. Just give it a few goes to see if you like it..so....practice a few freehand tshirts(?) on a separate piece of paper to figure out your process first with the ink. THEN Pencil a bear form (ie., vague area where head, arms & legs will be) . Do the wash with the colour for the shirt. Let it dry. Draw in the bear parts. Let it dry. Erase pencil lines. Yes it will take time but you can do a number of washes then draw the bears in later at your leisure. When I am drawing my trees I tend to have 3-5 on the go at once, in various stages. You will figure out your comfort zone and process through doing...

 

The point of the exercise is colour swatches.....that are fun to do.

Edited January 6, 2016 by Pira