Plein Air, watercolor, pen and ink

I am trying to push myself to do more Plein Air work, or painting and drawing from direct field observation. Don't get me wrong I love being outside, but I prefer to be moving, going from point A to point B, listening and observing and occasionally stopping to make a photograph or to try and ID a bird or flower. I don't really care for sitting in one spot waiting for the bugs to find me and attack. But I can't draw or paint while on the move so I am trying to push myself into sitting and doing either at least a couple of times a week.

The above is this past weeks plein air watercolor painting. I was at Borderland State Park in Easton trying to paint the area by the outflow stream for the ponds. When I finished it, I though, ugh, this is terrible, but looking at it now I still find it pretty amateur but the tree isn't too bad, at least it is better than a lot of trees I  have painted in the past and I rather like the greens on the distant shore.

I really need to spend more time painting with watercolor as doing the paintings is the only way to get good at using watercolors. It can just be so fussy that sometimes I don't have the patience for it. But I sometimes need to add color to my pen and ink drawings and watercolor is the best method so I must just keep at it.

I also got in a trip into Boston this week and instead of heading into the Public Gardens I headed over to Quincy Market and then on to Columbus Park over by North Wharf on the waterfront. They have 3 of these trellises set up with wisteria vines climbing up and over. I was hoping the flowers would be in bloom and putting on a show. I was a bit disappointed as while the flowers were just starting to bloom they had pruned the vines so heavily last fall that there isn't going to be much of a show.

Anyway I sat for a while on a bench, had some lunch and then did a pencil drawing of one of the trellises. After finishing the drawing I added a bit of pen work to help shade and define features of the structures. I think I need to work on my buildings and structures.

Above is another of my pen and ink doodles with all of my technical pens. Using the larger tipped pens means that I put in dark areas as that is what they are best at. I sort of like this and think I may be using these designs for something else, Will just have to wait and see what develops.

Photographed at Borderland the same day I did the plein air painting, it isn't exactly the same view though I was sitting not too far away. I have photographed this view often as it is a favorite of mine, so here it is with spring greens in the background also with a blue sky and some clouds, looks like a perfect spring day, which it was.

I love Jack in the Pulpits, they aren't flowers that scream "HERE I AM, LOOK AT ME" esp. as they are often totally green as this one was. But their elaborate shape with the hood hiding the spadix below is so wonderfully elaborate you just have to admire them. I photographed this one at North River, a MA Audubon sanctuary in Marshfield, MA. I had been on a trip to World's End in Hingham to look for Juniper Hairstreaks (a small butterfly) and decided to go down route 3a and visit North River before going home. I was rewarded by being able to photograph and see quite a few Jack in Pulpit plants and flowers.

That is it for today, per usual comments are welcome, and if you are curious I place a photo of the Juniper I saw on my facebook page, link at the bottom of the blog page.

Starting Something New, Journal Pages

The problem with finishing a work that I have spent a lot of time on is that I feel a bit at loose ends when it is done, and it can be hard to get the brain to focus on what I want to do next. I have of course been working on the drawings in the Journal pages, but I needed to start something new.

Last week I found myself feeling that the technical pens weren't totally doing it for me so I hauled out the crow quill and a bottle of ink. No I am not going to show you the scribbles I made while playing around the pen, but I did enough that I decided I wanted to try something a bit more focused.

My camera while excellent needs a new lens that will let me take close up pictures of birds without being right next to them, unfortunately the budget won't allow that expense right now, but every now and then I get lucky and get a fairly good photograph of a bird. I used one of those of a sparrow feeding to draw the above image. It is still in pencil and needs to be refined a bit, but I think so far so good. Next step will be applying some ink. Wish me luck, I have a feeling I am going to need it.

Below find a couple of Journal Pages:

The one above is from last Saturday. Daniel Webster Sanctuary was having it's annual Farm Day. They have games for the kids, music, some crafting tents (I avoided them) a Hayride and a few farm animals on display. The event was supposed to have happened back in Sept. but that Saturday it poured rain so they cancelled it and rescheduled for Oct. 22. It got a bit cloudy but at least it didn't rain, and it wasn't too chilly so I think it was a success. I did walk the sanctuary but saw few birds, only some Canada Geese in the fields, I think the rest had be frightened off by the noise of people having a good time.

The first drawing is of my usual tree trunk in the pond. The water level was the highest I have seen it. Covering most of the rocks that the turtles like to sun themselves on. There were just a couple of turtles out Saturday, it could be that despite our warm weather some are starting to realize that it is time to hibernate but I really don't know. I only know that I didn't see as many turtles this week as I have in the past.

Next drawing is a bit hard to make out, it is of the tractor pulling the hay wagon with riders around the sanctuary paths. I think I should have been a bit more sketchy with the background.

Last drawing is from a photograph I made of one of the farm animals, this is a kid (young goat) with an itch. I rather liked the photo, but not sure my drawing did it justice.

Next pages are from my Monday visit to North River Sanctuary.

I often visit both Daniel Webster and North River sanctuaries on the same day. They are only a few miles apart in Marshfield, MA. Because I had been to Daniel Webster on Saturday I decided to spend my visit time on Monday at North River. I walked down to the overlook pier and spend some time just sitting and watching the river. The tide was low and still going out so mudflats were exposed. I got to see some shore birds, not sure just what, they were too far for me to identify even with my field glasses, probably Willet's and or Sandpipers feeding in the shallows and on the mud flats. Also saw some Cormorants diving in the river and then sitting on a raft to dry their wings. At one point a mallard duck swam by, he was also busy feeding in the river. It was a fairly mild day so I enjoyed just sitting and watching.

Drawings for Monday are top: a chipmunk that is taking advantage of a free meal in one of the bird feeders at the sanctuary. They mostly have the tubular hanging feeders for the smaller birds, but they also have this larger one that they spread seed in for larger ones. I have also seen squirrels and blue jays feeding there.

The bottom image is of a boat on the river, several passed by while I was sitting. I was able to  photograph this one and though it made a good image for the journal.

Below are a couple of photographs I made on my visits:

Above is a view of the pond at Daniel Webster, notice how high the water level is, and how golden the trees and grasses look. I just like the colors here, the contrast of the golden grasses/leaves with the gray/blue water and sky make I think a beautiful picture.

The above photo was made from the observation pier at North River looking back toward the woods that line the river edge. This is about as good as it gets this year for seeing fall color.

That is it for today. Not very exciting I know, but comments are appreciated anyway.

Sun Take 3 progress, and some Journals

Well this will probably be (for me anyway) a relatively short post. Above is the current status of my third try with my sun design. Note that I have darkened the background significantly with an olive green. I went back to the lighter lime green in the ribbons while leaving the center and the purple alone. I like how the center design and lime green pops against the background, while the purple is still dark enough to also show up.

I have a bit of tweaking left to do, but I think this will be the final version

Below is a scan of an interim step, I had darken the ribbon green a bit and added an overlay of yellow to the gray.

It is OK, but obviously I wasn't satisfied with it. Not sure why I picked the olive green, but once I started adding it to the background I decided that was the way I wanted to go. Then I needed to lift out some of the brighter green and redo the lime green. Both greens show up darker in the scan than they are in real life.

I think I need to live with this for a bit, before deciding how I actually like it.

Below are a couple of pages from my Nature Journal:

These drawings are from my Monday visit to Daniel Webster and North River in Marshfield, MA. I drew the log in the pond at Daniel Webster for the third time. The water level in the pond was as high as I have ever seen it and I wanted to document it. There were about 4 or 5 painted turtles all sharing the same log and catching some sun.

Otherwise nothing particularly to note, no new birds (for me) but the mosquitoes are viscous. I am beginning to look forward to the first hard frost.  Esp. as here in MA there is the concern about 2 diseases, West Nile and Triple E, Triple E is by far the worse of the two carried by mosquitoes, but West Nile can be no fun. I do use bug spray and thankfully haven't been bitten yet, but they do sometimes swarm a bit so are a concern.

The drawing of the trees is from North River, note the stone wall in the background. My problem with the leaf and the trees is that I am not sure what they are. The nearest I can come is some kind of Cherry. I think they are Choke Cherry trees, but only spring will really verify that for me. I know what the Choke Cherry flowers look like, even if I am not sure about the leaves or the bark. It is too late for the berries, which I just realized are very eatable, not just by birds and animals but by people.

When I was a kid living in Ill. we had a Choke Cherry tree in the front yard. I am positive that I was told then that the berries were poisonous. Though perhaps I was just told they were bitter and I made an assumption. During my research I recently learned that the Native Americans would crush the whole berry eating pit and flesh together, it was a valuable food crop for them.

The pages below are from my visit to Blue Hill Reservation on Tuesday Afternoon.

The top sketch is of the bird feeder area at the Trailside Museum location. The feeders were busy with Titmice, sparrows and some Chickadees. Over by the pond area the chipmunks were out in force collecting scattered duck food and maple seeds. I was able to make a few good photographs of the chipmunks, though they move so quickly I also made quite a few blurry ones.

The leaves are from trees around the parking lots. The maple is from a large Silver Maple located in the north lot, while the Black Locus leaf is from the lower lot along the roadside.

One last photo:

These pretty red leaves belong to a poison ivy plant. Needless to say I just photograph and don't touch these, though I am not sure how much of the chemical that most folks are allergic to is left in them when they are changing colors.

That is it for today. Comments are welcome.