coffee shop, new sketchbook, and a golf pencil

Today after visiting the art museum, I was inspired. I went over to the art store and bought some supplies, including a new sketchbook. On the way home I stopped for a hot tea (an interesting story in itself. Do you know that such a tea exists that if you were to be able to grow York Peppermint Patties on a bush, and you made a tea out of the flowers before they became full blown silver wrapped goodness THAT is what this tea tasted like? Yummy for a once in a while thing, but not an every day one.) and as I was sitting there, I decided I should sketch and borrowed one of those impossibly small golf scorecard pencils from the guys running the show. And here is the result. :-)  (I darkened it a bit with my version of photoshop so you would be able to see the lines.)

Running Out...

Em drew Elvis, who just happens to be one of her favorite musical artists. I thought "Hm. I think I'D like to try drawing Elvis." But since I didn't want to make this into some sort of competition, I decided to draw the OTHER famous Elvis. It worked out well, I think, as the thicker brush part of my marker pen has just about had it. The whole thing turned out with almost a woodcut look. I diggit. :-)

G

No, really. It's the letter G. In sign language. :-D I love drawing hands. Anything that's hard and I screw up a lot I tend to practice on a lot.

My Silly Brother

This is Dennis. Dennis is very cool not because he's my brother (well, I'm cool and so he's cool by association that way, too...) but he's cool because he's quiet. He's a hard worker. He's very intelligent. And very serious. But at just the right moment...right when you really need a little levity in the room... out pops his quiet, dry sense of humor. And with a few words or one look you feel better because of the absurd silliness that washes over you. Here I was taking a photo and he got right in the lens and mugged it up. So we've got distortions from the lens playing with the anatomy. :-)

My Owie.

Well, partly my owie. Mostly my thumb. Outside drawing while the puppy (who GAVE me the owie) played. :-) So... loose sketch, not detailed. Just some fun.

more little face...

My niece and her cute little button nose and avid curiosity on everything. And minimal hair lines. :)

Little face

I love little faces... that age between toddler and teen where proportions sorta go all out of whack in an attempt to go from baby to adult. Ears seem big, teeth are bigger, faces stretch... :-)

Singing

03-24-2012. Well, he WAS singing. And playing the guitar. At the coffee shop. Of course he'd finished right before I came in and was sitting there having a pastry. I missed it. :-/ But I didn't miss the opportunity to sketch him.

Coffee Shop without the pen

03-23-2012. Today I wandered to the coffee shop for a hot tea. I wasn't sure whether or not I was going to go grocery shopping, and so I sat there, pondering whether or not to brave the rain off and on to go for my Special K and other assorted items. It was a grand time, relaxing, thinking (when I wanted to), sketching a few of the people that happened to be in there. Watching the people pass by. :-)

The cool part....

03-22-2012...about sketching outside while the puppy plays and occasionally chews on you is that you get fresh air, and a fresh perspective. No humans around to sketch, no internets to steal a photo to sketch off of, no WAY to print out a photo to sketch... since puppy would probably think "Yum!" and it'd be gone. So what do you do?  You look around. This was my next door neighbor's window. he blinds were down and the lights were on so I caught cool shadows of the vase and the blinds, and in front of them... an evergreen bush and a tree not budding yet. I was aiming more for shape and line and notsomuch actually looking exactly LIKE... :)

Collaboration

03-21-2012. Tonight's sketch was a collaboration between myself and Miss Cindy, the wound up pup. Hopefully you get that I'm the one that sketched the dandelion leaves and she's the one that donated the mud. :-D

Val

03-20-2012. I borrowed another friend for a ten minute sketch. Well, the ten minutes was actually thirty, but technically twenty of that was taking out the foster puppy to go potty halfway in between... :-)

Jason

03-19-2012. This is my friend Jason. I borrowed Jason to see how quick a quick sketch could be. A bit less than ten minutes, give or take a few.  Not bad. All this practice is doing some good. :)

me. again.

03-18-2012... when you run out of models, there's always yourself... :-)

tonsil time

03/17/2012...Little man getting ready to get his tonsils out. Looser, Quicker sketch with the thin tip of the pen, added in thicker likes with the brush end. :)

eye eye

03/16/2012... :-)

me

03-15-2012. Not intentionally. I pulled up my photo folder on here, closed my eyes, and clicked. And there I was... looking up.

the other end

03-14-2012..of the pen. Go figure, I found a pointy end on the other side and sketched with that. Then brought out the thicker end for some darker shadowy. It was fun. :)

two posts...

 03-12-2012. I went on a roadtrip pack to where there is no internets to post. No, I'm not joking. It still DOES exist... And it was quite pleasant because instead of focusing on current events I sketched and read. This dog is a statue that my mother bought for my father and has been sitting on one of the two end tables in her house for as long as I can remember. Yes, that means decades.

03-13-2012. This one was intentionally left unfinished..just to see what it looks like. I rather like the design of it.  :)

George Washington

03-11-2012. Profile. Every time I draw a profile I annoy myself some. Why? Partly because it makes me think of George Washington on a quarter. And partly because it seems annoyingly simple to be so hard to do and make look good.  Perhaps it's the lips. Perhaps it's the nose. It always makes it seem flat to me. And et I continue to try.....

Back to the book...

That teeny tiny one I was using to sketch in a while ago. I was off hunting up C.D.'s and buying puppy food and didn't want to haul the big sketchbook along again. Good thing... I came back arms full....

Practicing on Esther...

03-09-2012. I hadn't really sketched from this particular angle before, so Esther was the perfect specimen. angle-y face, glasses...pretty much anything to throw a monkey wrench into the sketch. But I kinda like this one...

Newt Too

03-08-2012. So how DOES one sketch beard stubble? Leaving it off looks weird, but outlining it makes it look like a weirdly flat beard. hm. So the solution I came up with today? Rough lining, and not a total outline. I think this works for me.... :-)

Newt

03-07-2012. This is Newt. Newt is an artist. He does excellent tattoos. He also does not mind mugging for the camera. He let me borrow his face. I'm trying to decide if I went too far adding in the deeper shadow outlining the side of his nose and face... Otherwise I like. I have another one to try, which I think I will. Of him being debonair... :-D

another flower

03-06-2012. I wanted to see shapes really, more than the flower itself. I suppose if I'd sketched it larger it'd lose more of it's flower-y-ness... but I liked the negative spaces in there too. :)

Mountain Man...

03-05-2012...Also known as Kelby my nephew. Who, at one time..the size of a shoe...I used to sit and rock and sing to until he went to sleep. WOW was THAT a long time ago. :-D  I loosened up a bit more on this one, carried in the really deep shadow, and left out the detail... I think I like this balance.

Sadie

03-04-2012. I haven't sketched a lot of animals. So last night I saw a photo of this little girl, Sadie, on my friend Lisa Lyon's facebook page. It has Centerline Photography down in the bottom corner. I'm not sure if that's her photography, but it was a great photo and I DO know that she's a great photographer. :) Also a great person, since Sadie is her foster pet, looking for a forever home. It was a challenge sketching her, since 3/4 view is hard to sketch on a human, and I sketch lots of humans... and it's a bit harder on something fuzzy that you haven't done... :)  But it was fun. And she's adorable.

More unknown people.

03-03-2012. At the coffee shop again. Sketching random guy across the room on his laptop... :)

Little giggler

03-02-2012. I tried, this time, to resist the extra lines. And I think that I did rather well. :)

P.S. Baby really WAS giggling. but with the binkie in his mouth it was kinda hard to tell....

Carmen stole a hat.

03-01-2012. Or not. But either way, it looks smashing on her. Today's challenge? That cowboy hat. Giving it shape and making it look like it's poking out over her face and not laying flat like an eye patch. :-)