I can't believe it is December

 Oh where has the time gone, I can't believe it has been 6 months since I last updated the blog. Oops, sorry about that anyone who is still checking it out. Been busy but not with art, well, not with drawing. Photography after all is considered by some art and I have been busy talking walks and making photographs.

I have done just a little drawing, mostly just pen work. The above sparrow done in pen and ink was my attempting to get back to my drawing by doing the Inktober pen drawings a day. Then I got sick, and while I wasn't all that sick I was sick enough that I just didn't have the energy or motivation to follow through; next year, maybe.

 The above bottle drawing was done for the first of Inktober (October) but isn't really very good so I put the sparrow first as I was much happier with that one. The top image is the one that shows up in links, so I like the first image to be one of my better posts.

 This rather abstract drawing was me playing with some new to me colored pencils. Over the summer I purchased some of the Dick Blick line of pencils. They are OK, but not really artist quality, there just isn't enough pigment in the leads for them to make the grade. Still I had fun playing with the colors.

 I have a new camera, a Canon D70 and I am in love with it. The old Canon Rebel and I parted ways, and since I have become addicted to making photographs, I had to immediately replace it. The D70 is a much better camera and I am making some really lovely photographs. The above is a Titmouse about the land at a bird feeder. This was made at the feeders at Borderland State Park, Easton, MA.

 The above photo is a couple of Canada Geese in flight, they had just taken off from the panne at Daniel Webster in Marshfield, MA.

 Above is the Smith Farm house in Borderland State Park. The sky was overcast but opened up enough to give me this spot lighting of the house, background trees and meadow just around the house.

Last but not least I was busy putting together the 2017 calendars using photographs I have been making through the year, though mostly in the spring and summer. I am quite pleased with this years selections, hopefully I am not only making better photographs but doing a better job selecting the images I use. 

That is it for today, there are more photographs on my Facebook page if you are curious since I was posting photos there over the summer. Per usual comments are welcome.

Christmas, sewing and a drawing

I have just returned from my Christmas trip out to Chicago to visit my sister. Above is the only drawing I am including in today's blog update. I made this sketch while waiting at Logan Airport for my flight to board. The man was looking out the window at the various activities that were going on around the planes waiting for passengers. I did make another drawing, but though this is very sketchy I prefer this one out of the two I made. 

A lot of my time prior to my leaving on my trip was taken up by sewing. Above is a photo showing the 5 bags that I finished this month to give as gifts. Two went to my niece, one to her daughter, one to my sister and I kept one. Because they were gifts I couldn't write or post about them on the blog prior to Christmas.

Out of the 5 bags two of them were ones I had started last year and never finished, the other 3 are ones that I cut the fabric for this year, using a slightly different approach.

The older method calls for more cutting and piecing before cutting the pattern out, but I like the finished look better so. With the older method I was cutting six inch strips and then sewing them together prior to cutting the pattern. For the bags I made this year I cut four pattern pieces out of 2 different fabrics and then did some mixing and matching. Since I am using half yards of fabric I need to add strips to the bottom to make the bags long enough. But I need to do that with both methods so in that way it doesn't matter which method I use. I have decided to go back to the original method for the bags I am planning on sewing this next year.

You are going to have to look closely at the above 3 images to realize what you are seeing. There are 6 objects in the above images not 3. Each scan is of 2 mug rugs that I gave to my sister for Christmas. I used her scanner for the images and the bed was a bit too small to show all edges.

My sister likes to sit at the counter in her kitchen to drink her morning tea. In the past it has been her habit to place her mug on top of a pot holder on the counter to help keep the tea warm in the cup. This year inspired by a possible exchange with friends I decided I should make her some mug rugs. They are 6 x 9 inch small quilts that can be used in place of a pot holder. Well in place of a pot holder on the counter, they can't be used as pot holders to haul hot pans out of an oven.

All of them used blocks (units) that I had hand pieced at one point or another and just never put into anything larger. For the top 4 I used four 4 patch units, selecting those with approximately the same coloring and adding some hand dyed fabrics to give me the size I needed. The bottom 2 used a couple of friendship star blocks along with some indigo dyed fabric I had purchased. I kept the quilting to in the ditch, so it was quick and fairly easy to do.  I think finishing off threads took almost as long as the actual quilting.

There is batting between the layers though I used the pillow case method of finishing the edges (sewed and turned, then stitched about a quarter inch away from the edge. I didn't see any reason to spend the time actually putting binding on these mini quilts. The opening on the turned edge was slip stitched closed prior to my quilting the pieces.

They were kind of fun to make and I certainly have enough of a stash of finished units to make more of these this coming year.

One last image, the Christmas tree in my Sister's apt. on Christmas morning. Presents are bagged in Christmas fabric bags making for a colorful display under the tree.

I did spend a fair amount of time over the Holiday drawing so will include some of those drawings in my next update. In the meantime I hope everyone who celebrated enjoyed their Holiday and are looking forward to 2014.

New ATC, another flower drawing and photographs

Just a short blog update today. Above is a new Artist Trading Card (ATC). I used the same background pattern for this as I used for one of my latest bookmarks. This background came out a bit better than the bookmark. ATC's are a bit wider than the bookmarks and I was a bit more aware of the pitfalls of drawing a basket weave pattern as a background.

This card seems to be saying more spring than Christmas or winter to me, but these were the colors I was in the mood to use. Since we are supposed to be getting at least a few inches of snow I suppose it is just wishful thinking on my part. Media is pen and ink with added colored pencil.

I have several arrangements of artificial flowers around the apt. The drawing above is one of the first I put together. It sits on the table in the kitchen/dining space which happens to get a lot of sun, so the purple flowers are getting a bit faded. I suppose it is time to get rid of them and either get something else or just let the vase be empty. Colored pencil with ink laid in on top. The actual arrangement is fuller, but somehow I think I missed that feeling in the drawing. Guess I will just have to try again another day.

A couple of photographs to end this short update, above is one of the flowers on my White Christmas Cactus. Love that touch of pink at the heart of the flower.

My miniature cyclamen is blooming. Love the intense red of these flowers. I thought I would capture the look now as when I get back from Christmas the plant will probably look a bit sad. I will bag this so it will survive, but it doesn't like being bagged so is a bit droopy for months afterword.

That it is for today, have been busy trying to get ready for Christmas so not doing a lot of drawing. In the meantime comments are always welcome.

Christmas Cactus, apples and figures

I have a lot of plants in my Apt. and several of them are Christmas Cactus, right now I have 2 different colors blooming, a couple of pinks and a couple of whites. I did have an old large pair of Christmas Cactus that would bloom a gold/yellow color, but over this past summer the plants started failing. I have had this happen before, the main stalk just seems to dry up and the plants die. I have tried to take cuttings from the plants and I think a few have them have taken but there will be no golden blossomed flowers for me this Christmas, maybe next year.

Anyway I decided it might be fun to try and draw one of the pink blooming plants. I used colored pencils to just lay in the colors based on the shape of the plant then I went back in with pen and ink to add some lines to give shape. The drawing is quite impressionistic not my usual style and almost looks more like a water color than a pencil drawing. Still I rather like the results. Next plant to tackle is my blooming miniature cyclamen.

As a challenge to myself I hauled out a bowl I particularly like added a couple of apples and set out to draw them. I am much happier with the results above than I was with the drawings I made on Thanksgiving. At least these look like apples in a bowl and the results aren't too lopsided.

Above are some drawings from a short pose figure drawing session a couple of weeks ago. Top 3 are short 2 minute poses, bottom grouping of 3 are longer poses, 5 to 10 minutes. Not totally happy with these drawings, faces could be a lot better on the longer poses, but I think with the short poses I caught the energy of the pose, always a goal.

The last image is another of the photographs I made during my visit to Houghton's pond. There was one seagull that day at the pond, I think it had found something to eat, but not sure just what, there are fish in the pond (it is stocked). Anyway I just like this photo of the flying gull and its reflection in the water. The green in the background are the white pines that grow so abundantly in this area.

Above is a photograph I made a couple of years ago of my golden blossomed Christmas Cactus. Made when the plants were healthy and blooming,  not a common color, and I won't be happy if I lose the plants entirely.

That is it for today, per usual comments are always welcome and I hope everyone's holiday shopping is going well.

Figures, a bookmark and a drawing

Been working on another bookmark. Course right now all that is finished is the main design, still needs some work before it is finally finished. It may have to wait a bit as I need some sunlight to pick the embroidery floss color for the tassel. I will probably go with a red orange.

The inspiration for this was my memories of poppies blooming in the late spring, love those large bright orange flowers. They are such a splash of color. I added tulips in the front of them though in reality tulips would be finished by the time the poppies start blooming. I wanted another flower shape and was feeling a bit tired of daisies/sunflowers. Besides using tulips let me pick up the orange of the poppies.

It was fairly quick and fun to draw, have to start thinking about what to draw next. Oh yes done with pen and ink first then added color via colored pencil, back to my more usual method of working.

Since I made such a mess of the basket the other day I though I would try my hand at another symmetrical object. This ink bottle was at hand and seemed a good choice. Still some errors but I am happier with this drawing than I was with the basket.

I have a small blooming Christmas Cactus maybe I will give that a go next.

From a couple of weeks ago, we had another couple modeling short poses for us. I don't have a lot of drawings that I liked from that session, but above are the five I consider my best effort. Top pair are short poses of about 5 minutes. Bottom grouping of three drawings were 10 minute poses.

Not sure why I felt so off that evening. Probably focusing too much on details, like faces and not looking at the overall image. The male of this couple is quite slender so not the easiest figure to draw.

As a close another photograph from my visit to Houghton's Pond last Saturday. Our weather this week has been not wonderful (read no sun) and I have been busy trying to get stuff pulled together for Christmas. Winter landscapes are so stark mostly browns and greys with a few pine trees to add hints of green.

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

Sketches, a new ATC and some DrawingTools

Above is a new Artist Trading Card (ATC) that I finished over the weekend. It didn't come out quite the way I was envisioning it when I started, which I suppose means that I need to make another one that may be more in line with my concept, except at this point I am not sure what the original concept was. I hope I am not the only person who looses track of the original concept once they start working. Sometimes that is a good thing, but with this card I am not so sure.

Thanksgiving day I spent with friends and while listening to the chatter I spent some time sketching, these two drawings are a result. Hmm, all I can say is that I think I need to spend a lot more time drawing from life. I am not totally thrilled with either the basket or the cup. Though the cup drawing is a bit better than the basket.

Above is a cup of tea with a teaspoon in it. Course the cup did have a design on it, but there was no way I was going to attempt that.

My friends family includes several fairly young children, and of course they were interested in my drawings and supplies. Since I use some tools that aren't familiar to them there were quite a few questions. It occurred to me that I might include some of the information I shared with them here on the blog. So the above image is some of my standard drawing tools. On the left a kneaded eraser, bottom middle is a clutch pencil holder, above that is the 2 mm "lead" that fits the holder, and on the right is a pink pearl eraser.

Because of cost and ease of  "sharpening" I prefer to use clutch pencils with 2mm leads. Course the tool used for pointing the leads can get a bit messy to haul around so I keep one in a plastic bag, but I don't think it is quite as messy as a regular pencil sharpener. I also use kneaded erasers which most of the kids had never seen before. One young boy wanted to insist that it was a piece of clay since that was what he was familiar with. The kneaded eraser is used to lift a bit of graphite when things have gotten a bit too dark. I also like Pink Pearl erasers, but those are fairly common so no comment was made about those.

For the clutch pencils I have several different hardness, B, 2B, 3B, 4B, 2H, 3H, and 4H, each in its own holder. I prefer the Staedtler Mars carbon  leads as they seem to be the best quality. For the really soft grades (above 4B) I use regular wooden pencils. The softer the graphite the darker the line you can get, a 2H is more grey than black, though graphite is never truly black but only a dark grey. For best lifting with a kneaded eraser I find that it needs to be warm so I tend to hold it in my opposite hand when I am doing work where I will be using it.

Saturday was a beautiful though chilly sunny day with a few clouds. I drove up to the Blue Hills Reservation and walked around Houghton's Pond. Above is a photo of the pond that I made that day. I find it interesting that clouds in photographs at this time of year even in early afternoon have some pink/lavender color to them.

The pond looks so still and calm reflecting the trees, clouds and sky. There were some ducks on the pond, but since I hadn't brought my field glasses I am not sure of the species, all I know is they weren't mallards as some of them were diving under the water and mallards don't dive. As you can see there were no beach goers there that day.

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

Various Journal Pages

I have not made a lot of progress with my holiday journal.  Oops, oh well I do have photos and will have to spend more time with it when I get home. Now I seem to be spending most of my time visiting with relatives and working on another piece of art, or using the camera. So I will just have to create the pages from my reference photos, I know not the way it is supposed to work but it will have to do for me.

I have managed to get a couple pages done. The above page is the front piece and I am rather pleased with it. The poinsettia was done with colored pencil. The lettering is no particular font just something I thought looked nice.

Above is the pen and ink drawing I made for the second page, how I got to the airport for my trip. I plan to include an airport scene but haven't drawn it yet.

The page below is from my Nature Journal, my second trip to Broadmoor in Natick made over 10 days ago.

The 2 sketches from that visit are fairly simple. The top is the seed pod of a Catalpa tree. The tree is located just outside of the sanctuary's visitor center. Typically there were still some pods hanging from the tree but there were also a few on the ground. I collected one of the pods on the ground to draw.

The second drawing is of a mill stone. The property at Broadmoor once contained a grist mill, and the mill ponds and flow-ways are an integral part of the site. The stone is to commemorate the mill and I don't believe it is an original stone. There is nothing left of the original mill structure, just the dams, spillways and ponds.

I am including a couple of photographs I made while visiting the sanctuary.

The above is a view of the Charles River with its tree lined river bank. Because of recent storms the river was outside it summer banks and running fairly high and swiftly.

By the time I was leaving the sanctuary the sun was beginning to set. The above is an eastern view of one of the ponds showing how even clouds in the east can pick up some color when the sun is setting. You can see a corner of one of the walkways in the lower left.

That is it for today. Hope everyone is enjoying their winter solstice holidays, per usual comments are welcome.

More Bags, a Journal Page and Figure Drawing

I have been traveling, and visiting with family so am a bit late with this blog update. Before I left on my travels I purchased a Christmas gift for myself, a new lens for my Camera. It is a 55mm to 250mm lens and I am hoping to make better photographs of birds and butterflies with it once I get used to it.

The only thing was, the new lens won't fit in my current camera bag with the camera and its old lens. There were a couple of options, I could purchase a larger camera bag that would hold both lenses and camera and other stuff (cables, manuals etc) or I could make a separate bag to carry the lens. Since I don't really want to haul around a larger camera bag I decided to make a small bag that would hold just the lens. One that I could easily wear while out and about in the areas I go to photograph. So I pulled out some fabrics, my rotary cutter, the cutting mat and started cutting.

The bag in the above image is the end result. Just large enough to hold the new or old lens, with a long enough strap so it can easily be carried while I am out walking so I can swap out lenses if I need/want to. There is batting between the inner lining and the outer fabric to protect the lens. I also placed the seams on the outside to keep lint/loose threads away from the lens. I didn't use a pattern but sort of made it up as I went along. The strap is braided fabric strips.

I think it is pretty and functional, and actually used it on my walk in Daniel Webster this past monday. It worked very well and is light enough to not be a burden.

Below is a page out of the Nature Journal from over a week ago.

This was also a visit to Daniel Webster but was a week ago Monday. Weather was chilly, with a slight film of ice around some of the edges of the ponds. The image is of a goose taking off from the pond. Looked like it was walking on water in the photo so I couldn't resist using it for my page image for the day.

Below is my figure drawing from this past Monday evening.

It was a good session with a few non-regular artists dropping in to draw. I was feeling a bit distracted that evening, what with my mind wanting to think about the things I had to get done prior to my leaving on my trip. So I am not sure the drawing is as successful as it could have been, still all things considered I am not displeased with the results.

Below are a couple of photographs I made at Daniel Webster over a week ago.

Blue sky with one of the marsh plants seed heads against it.

The photo above is the one I used as reference for my page drawing. You can see how stark everything has gotten now that winter is finally settling in. Birds in flight are poetry in motion no question. These Canada Geese taking off from the pond are certainly that.

That is it for today. Per usual comments are always welcome.

Bagging Christmas, and start of a new Drawing

I have started the above pen and ink work in the past couple of days. The elaborate border was drawn first in one of my sketch pads and I am using tracing paper to transfer it to my good paper. I am using gray Stonehenge for this and will be using stipple in the background of the border. Not sure what I am going to put in the middle yet. I think some flowers and have been searching my photographs for the right reference image.

Needless to say this part of the work is finicky and find myself able to spend just so much time on it before I want/need to work on something else.

With the Christmas season approaching (rapidly) I have been spending a fair amount of time on preparing gifts for my family. Last year I decided to bag my gifts instead of using wrapping paper and I am continuing the tradition this year. The bags are made out of Christmas fabric which I think has prettier designs than wrapping paper does and can be reused instead of thrown out. They are simple to make, a couple of side/bottom seams a turn over at the top to make a pocket that a ribbon can be threaded through (leave a gap near the top of one of the side seams, so that when it is folded over inside there is an opening to the pocket on the outside). I think it takes me longer to iron and trim the fabrics for the bags than it does for me to sew the seams. Anyway in the top photo above you can see my pile of made bags with some of the gifts to be "bagged".

The middle photo is of one of the bags, you can see the ribbon used to close the opening trailing across the bag.

Bottom photo shows all of the gifts bagged and ready to be boxed up and mail off. I designed the name tags last year. Those I print off on fairly heavy weight paper, cut apart, punch a hole in the corner, add names and attach to the proper bag, and call it done. Hmm, maybe I should think about purchasing several yards of Christmas fabrics and selling the bags in my Esty shop next year. I suppose I could also design some tags that could go with them.

Below is a page from my Nature Journal from a trip over the Weekend to Blue Hills Reservation.

The images are of a dried seed head of a late blooming goldenrod. As I have said before this kind of material isn't going to survive the winter, and I have always thought that dried grasses and seed heads were visually interesting so will continue to include them as long as it is available.

The bottom drawing is of a Screech Owl. It was chilly the day I was in the animal exhibit area at Trailside Museum and not much in the way of animal life was visible or active so I decided to go into the museum. The Naturalist was there holding this small owl. I asked if I could make a couple of photos and I used one as the reference for the above drawing.  They think this is a female, but even so she is a small bird with brownish coloring. They are night hunters of mice, moths and other small creatures. They do have ear tufts though this one wasn't really displaying them. It certainly looks cute, but they really don't make good pets.

Last image today is a photograph I made at Houghton's Pond showing some skim ice on the pond. After our very warm fall the temps are finally falling to more seasonable weather. The Sunday I was in the park I saw this ice along the southern edges of the pond. The shadows from trees and bushes growing at the ponds edge prevent the sun from shining on these areas so even though it was after noon and the sun had been shining all day and the air temp was in the 40's these areas of ice remained.

Enough for today. Per usual comments are appreciated.

Finished Sketches and a Figure Drawing

My top two images today are the finished drawings done from the Thanksgiving Day sketch. The one above is only pen and ink on Bristol Board, the one below was done on Hot Press Watercolor paper and is colored pencil. The top image is larger 9.0 x 12.0 inches. The colored pencil piece is only 7.0 x 9.0 inches.

I prefer the pen and ink piece, I find it more visually interesting even though it doesn't have color. The blocks of color in the colored pencil piece bother me a bit, but I am not sure how to apply the color so that it is more interesting yet not muddied or too busy.

Sorry for the image quality on these, I photographed them both and I should have set up the tripod and checked angles, neither photo is entirely square as it should be. Both pieces are just a bit too large for my scanner.

Below is my figure drawing from last night.

We had a more upright pose last night, different from what we usually have. Lighting was also different as she was lit from above. It looks like a deceptively simple pose, though it wasn't entirely easy to draw.

Below is a page from a visit I made last week to Borderland State Park.

The drawings are fairly simple, the top one is the tip of a branch of Northern White Cedar including some of the pine cones. These trees were growing around the old farm house that is on the property and aren't something I often see in the woods I visit. More typically I see Eastern Red Cedar, I am saving that drawing for a later date. In the center of the page I did a close up sketch of one of the pine cones as they are really very simple compared to most pines and I didn't feel the top sketch really depicted that.

Bottom drawing is a tree stump that was covered with shelf mushrooms. They may not be doing any growing at this time of year, but they are still viable. Since my available subject matter has been reduced I will draw anything that strikes my fancy, expect to see more tree trunks before spring arrives.

I made the above photo at Borderland and is of one of the ponds, there is a small grouping of mallard ducks in the center of the pond. I think they were all females and spent most of their time feeding. I selected this photo because of the light/shadows and the colors of the clouds. The photo was actually made in the middle of the afternoon, but with the nearness of the winter solstice, daylight is short this time of year and the sun was already getting low in the western sky.

That is it for today. Hope everyone is enjoying good health and getting ready for the up coming Holidays. Per usual comments are welcome.