Working on Projects

Well she still isn't finished but I have made progress on her. First I put her aside to finish the pen and ink work, then I got distracted working on Nature Journal pages and trying to figure out varieties of oak trees by looking at leaves and acorns. I promise I will get her done, as I think she is coming along rather nicely. I find the patterns on the feathers beautiful though I admit a pia to draw which is why she is taking so long.

Above is one of those Nature Journal pages that I have been spending so much time on. I actually used a bit of colored pencil on these pages which feature two types of goldenrod's that I have been seeing on my walks. There are a lot more varieties of goldenrod than just the 2 I was featuring here but these two were mainly what I was seeing at Daniel Webster on my walk. One is more suited to the shade of the red maple groves and the other was growing along the sunny edges of fields, and was more of a small bush than one slender stalk with flowers.

The other image is my standard one of the tree stump in the panne. This week the water level hadn't changed much from what it was the previous week. Meaning it was a bit higher than the low point I had seen earlier in the summer.

All drawings are from my September 10th visit to Daniel Webster in Marshfield, MA.

Above is my figure drawing from Monday nights session in the Studio. I am much happier with my drawing this week. It might be the pose or it might be the lighting. I found the strong light from directly above the model to be something I didn't particularly enjoyed drawing. I said so at the start of this weeks session and the several of my fellow artists took me to task. They said they enjoyed the changes and that the same light week after week gets old. Hmm, I understand what they are saying, I don't want to draw the same pose from week to week, but I think my objection to the lighting is still valid.

Fairly close up photograph of one of the Goldenrod's I have been seeing in the sanctuaries I visit. They are pretty yellow flowers and the bees love them. They don't seem too attractive to butterflies, unless they are the only blooms around. I expect the flowers don't have much in the way of nectar, so the pay off for visiting is lower. The bees also want the pollen so find the flowers more attractive. As an aside the pollen that most people are allergic to this time of year is ragweed, goldenrod pollen is too heavy to float in the air.

Photograph of a landing seagull, made at my local Brockton park. This is probably a first year gull as it has a lot of brown on its head and body. Mature Herring gulls are white with some black and grey, and just a little  brown around the neck in winter.

That is it for today, per usual comments are welcome.