Out and about

This past weekend was without doubt the Indian summer - weather worth of the month of July. I took advantage and went for a walk on the Canal and on the Plateau. I did not remake the Altoid palette, so I used watercolor crayons to add some color. I must say that I like the effect and I am planning to use them more often. I also bought some Inktense pencils and I will be using those more often also.

I wanted to practice continuous contour drawing. The topic came up few times in Paraty. I was also reminded of it in a watercolor book I have. This is something that I tried sporadically in the past and it is definitely harder than it sounds.

Wide lens

First attempt at a landscape view on a spread - view from Santa Teresa with the Sugarloaf in the back, laguna Freitas. 

Vertical view revisited

I did not like my location sketches in Santa Teresa, so I am slowly redoing them and playing with different media.

In the first one I played with the skyline, lowering it.

 This one was an almost continuous line and abstraction of the forms. I like this one the most.

Same thing, I wanted to play with the line thickness but I had the markers handy so I thought about adding that too.

Begginings ...

... of sorts.

I spent one of the last days in Rio in great company - Marc, Lynn, Suhita, Liz , Esther, Beliza and others. They filled sketchbooks (literally!) with great sketches. I blame my lack of success of the scarcity of materials after I lost my sketchbooks and art supplies :)

I had one sketchbook left with Fabriano paper and a felt pen. I worked on spreads - a first for me.
I tried a vertical view, a landscape and a wide perspective.

I am reworking them, trying different media and compositions and also trying to apply what I learned in the workshops. I will probably do a lot of sketching from the photos taken in Brazil, mostly due to my work./school schedule...

Food

This vacation was going to be "it" in terms of sketching: I was going to sketch a lot, everything and anything and finally find my "signature" sketching style. I took 4 sketchbooks: 2 bigger ones for the workshops and location sketches (both lost ) and 2 smaller ones that were to become a food diary and a people diary. 

I had this crazy idea of sketching all the food I ate. Ha! Of course it did not work out as planned. I ate stuff from street vendors, in the middle of the crazy traffic or in conditions unfit for drawing. Most importantly, I did not have time. I was not only on a sketching mission, but also on a sight-seeing mission and I wanted it al. Something gotta give ... and overall I sketched less that I hoped (it takes me a lot of time to draw even an incomplete sketch). 

The only food that made it in the sketchbook is the one I had at the airport and on the plane: 

Back ...

... from vacation. I spent almost three weeks in Brazil - Rio and Paraty - followed by few days visiting my family in Ottawa.

The trip was great, and the USK Symposium a lot of fun. I met many people, drew more than I ever did and got to know some of the authors I read regularly in the blogosphere.

Th fly in the ointment - I forgot my backpack with two sketchbooks, art supplies and souvenirs in the taxi in Rio ... So I lost all the sketches done at the workshops, as well as those done on my own ...

I am in the process of recreating the sketches - I took pictures of everything I sketched because I wanted to add color later. Needless to say, the process is slow... I have a modified work schedule so that I can also go to university 2 day a week. I will be posting as often as I can.

Meanwhile, here are some creatures I "found" today. I flipped through the sketchbook and this time something caught my attention on the page - the 2 chatty creatures at the bottom right. Then I found the little girl in a tutu and the bird-like creatures on the side.

They are telling a story, just not sure what it is yet ...