It was bright and sunny today but winter still hangs on, the snow is over a foot deep and I wish I had my snow-shoes on! The snow is heavy, wet and deep; as I trudge through it I thought of the word ’slogging’! Under the heavy snow is a deep, wet slaw of melted snow; I’m glad for my rubber boots.
"The Branches Reach Towards the Moon"
Ginger prances on ahead of me, begging me to hurry. Finally along the edge of the pasture I paused to catch my breath and attempt to capture a likeness of the moon with the trees reaching up towards it. At the end of this post you’ll see my small sketchbook and watercolors, and how I hold them on a clip board. Almost all my field sketches are done while standing and holding my book.
"The Field in Late February"
Well as you can read in my honest notes, Ginger surprised me and did something different; I feed her really I do! I guess you can’t stop instinct. I’m happy with how this little watercolor came out, I’m always trying to capture that color of the bushes in winter, they’re gorgeous. I was standing in deep snow and at the same time had to shrug my coat off my shoulders and take my hat off as the sun made me that warm. Maybe spring is coming?
"Paw Prints"
There are so many things to see if you take your time and look around you. The snow was quite hard on top, if you’re a lightweight animal. I noticed little tracks as I walked, then saw these little prints and had to sketch them. I brought no camera on purpose today, I wanted to really have to describe all I saw with my brush and pen. For tracks you can use your pencil or pen to measure the real size onto your sketchbook. I call this Comparative Measurements and it can be extremely accurate when you practice using it. These tracks were a bit hard to see because they were so shallow and the snow had dusted over them a bit. I drew the tracks at real size and then measured the distance between the sets, finding they were one pen length. This tells me it’s a small animal, at first I thought raccoon but when I looked on my pocket animal tracks guide I think it may be a skunk! Hey hibernation must be over! Look at this link to see a picture of my pocket track guide which, by the way, I don’t carry with me in the field.
"Snow Burrow"
Then as my eyes followed some more tracks, made by a fox I think, they led me to a small hole dug into the snow. I guessed that a fox, who used his great sense of hearing to listen for small mammals under the snow, had been by and dug down to ‘no surprise’ a burrow or tunnel of a vole. I like to think about the event that may have taken place, probably while the moon was shining on the snow at night. I wonder if he got his dinner?
"Paul's Chair"
As I said the sun was shining brightly as I returned from my day’s walk, trudging along the deep snowy lane. I looked off the lane into the woods and saw there a black metal folding chair. This chair is not there by mistake, my son Paul placed it there years ago and would disappear at times and he’d go here to sit in the woods. I think everyone should have a chair in the woods somewhere, where we can go escape or think. I felt a bit sad seeing it there by itself, perhaps it’s owner would never sit in it again as he’s off to college now. I just hope (as his mother) that he’ll always “find a chair somewhere” and sit in the woods.
Clip board with closed sketchbook
Here’s a picture of my clear clipboard with my handmade 4 1/2″ x 5″ sketchbook and watercolor palette attached. This is how it looks when I pull it from my bag, I use the rubber bands to hold the book shut and the palette. The palette is held on with blue ’sticky tack’ or ‘blue tack’. The sketchbook is clipped on with metal clips with the front cover.
Clip board with open sketchbook
This is how it looks when open, I use the white rubberband (actually it’s a hairband thing) to hold the piece of paper towel or to help hold the book open, or you can use a metal bankers clip. You can see I’m using my waterbrush today with the watercolors, I find it easier when hiking and especially in cold weather. Though it won’t work when it’s ‘really’ cold, it turns to ice on my paper!
I hope you enjoyed coming on my walk, please leave me a comment! I’ll have classes this summer in England where you can come along and sketch while we explore the gorgeous countryside. Please sign up your email address in the “subscribe to posts” box in the right column.
Today we visited Howdiemont Sands beach along the coast of the North Sea in Northumberland England. We walked across Sugar Sands and climbed up to a point where we could view the point at Howick Haven. I wanted to sit and try to do a small watercolor landscape so I bundled up and brought the usual field kit.
Water color painting "View of Howick Haven"
Here’s the finished painting, I did most in the field sitting on top a windy, grassy cold hill. I’ll share the photographs with you of what I saw and tell you a bit about how I did the little painting.
We walked along this beach
When you first arrive at Howdiemont Sands you can choose to walk either right or left. We chose left because it was new to us and we always wonder at what new views might be found or other discoveries.
Sugar Sands
The beach here (called Sugar Sands) is unbelievable, a pretty color of ’sand’ shade, (hahah…) clean, soft and inviting even on a cold sunny October day. You can see many other people and their dogs found the beach irresistible today too.
Bird tracks
There were lots of interesting bird tracks too, gulls leave a track with a little web foot. This one? It was big and looked like it would drag it’s front toe in the sand when it stepped; I wish I knew what it was.
Looking back at Sugar Sands
Here’s a view looking back on the beach we crossed, sometimes you have to go up over the grassy banks to get past areas that are under water still.
The red rocks below me
This is looking down from where I decided to paint, how beautiful the patterns and colors are in these rocks. As the tide continues to go out the rocks will be more exposed.
View from my painting spot
This is the gorgeous view from where I decided to sit, light was fading fast and I had to pick a place quick. It’s really hard to pick a scene when there’s so much to see around you. It helps to hold up your hands and make a little opening like a rectangle and pretend that’s your paper. Move your hands around until you find a cropped scene that you like.
View I painted
Because I wasn’t working really big I tried to limit what I was going to paint, also I didn’t have tons of time with the sun leaving soon as it was about 4:30pm when we arrived.
my sketch
I sat on a picnic blanket with a waterproof bottom, wore my wind/rain pants over my regular pants, this helped to cut the cold and wind. I also had on my fingerless gloves as usual, sorry no picture today! I’m using a homemade sketchpad that I created so it would be extra long. It’s great for landscapes! I worked with my field pan and regular watercolor brushes, usually when in the field I use my waterbrush. I don’t like the waterbrush for larger works needing big washes of color. You can see in the picture a baggy just off the blanket, tucked into the grass. I forgot a watercup to rinse my brushes in, so I used a baggy with some water in it, it worked great!!
My watercolor field pan
This is the painting/sketch laid out at home, you can see this is how far I got with it in the field. The pan watercolors I used is an old metal kit that I popped the large pans out of and replaced with half pans of Windsor Newton brand paints. I use a bit of sticky tack or blue tack to hold each one in place and you can see the handles on my brushes are cut, so I can fit more “things” in it. I brought that one long brush with me and used only that to do all this so far.
My set up to finish from photo at home
Now I set up my laptop with a photo I took while there, and worked on details with smaller brushes while looking at it. I didn’t touch the sky, just left it the way I did it in the field. If you start to mess around with all of it, it can get stiff looking. Notice I put my coffee on the left side…if your right handed, water should go on that side and you don’t want to be dipping into your coffee by mistake! So, I worked on trees and details of that main area; I also used a razor blade to scrape fine lines for the white fence. Also, you may have noticed a funny looking cone shape that looks like a child’s’ painting of a tree? It’s a recreation of one of the oldest ‘houses’ in Britain probably from the Bronze age. Remains of one were found on this very spot! They made their homes from tree limbs in a sort of tee pee style, with turf for the roofing material. I’ll try to find a link about it to add here.
Go here to see the finished painting in the GALLERY.
My finished miniature watercolor painting of a Great Grey Owl, measuring a mere 2″x2″! Be sure to check it out in my Owl Gallery too. It’s an owl named “Aspen” that I photographed at the Keilder Water Bird of Prey Centre in Northumberland England. I’ll show you the stages of painting and talk about how I did it below.
"Great Grey Owl" -first washes
This shows the first stages of painting, the beginning washes to lay down the values, color hue and expression of the painting. I first started with a light sketch in pencil, lifting it as much as I could with a kneaded rubber eraser before painting. Then I painted the washes and sprinkled salt on wet areas to see how it would ‘pull’ the color and create interesting patterns. It is at this stage of the painting that you can get a feel for how the painting will go, will you be loose and expressive? Will you go for more details? Sometimes I think we have to let our intuition guide us, or perhaps our mood.
First wash set up
This picture shows you my set up for the first washes, I always start flat on the table so the color doesn’t run. Many times on larger paintings I stand up and work loosely with my brush. (check out this short Utube video of me working on the “Screech Owl” painting, it shows how I paint loosely when standing). This set up shows my photo reference to the left, the salt above that, then my field palette to the right because I’m right handed, the water bowl above that. I keep a white paper towel folded nearby for wiping off excess water and it allows me to see if there’s paint left on my brush. You see my magnifying lamp which I find good because the light is cool and matches daylight; but I don’t use the magnifier on it as I find it clumsy to use my brushes under it and I bump into all the time when I lean in super close! Sometimes I use a hand held magnifying glass or you’ll see pictures later of my glasses.
Great Grey Owl -stage 3
Now here in stage 3 you see I’ve jumped ahead with lots of details and color. As you work, squint your eyes at the photo and your painting to catch large areas of value that need to be developed and notice color hues. At one point I felt my owl was too brown so I washed a very watered down blue grey over areas, but only on very dry areas. In areas you need to lighten you can either lift color with a damp brush and blot with a paper towel, or you can add it using white watercolor or gauche mixed with your paint colors.
Now on purpose I’m going to point out some things that I found to be unsatisfactory in my painting and I changed. At stage 3 here, I felt like I did a pretty nice painting! I was feeling like it was done, ah….no such luck. If you let it sit a day or two and return to it, or if you show it with the photo reference to a friend with a sharp eye, they’ll be sure to catch something ‘off’ with it. If you’re a conscientious artist, you’ll be bothered by it until you fix it and you probably already knew it was wrong to begin with but wanted to ignore it!  Well lets just say my boyfriend has a good eye, sigh, well now he ‘did’ pick me didn’t he? We both agreed the beak wasn’t right, I pointed it out to him then when he agreed it was back to the easel with it. I can’t believe how much I was able to amend the beak being that this is watercolor after all. People are afraid of watercolor because they think it’s unforgiving, wait until you see the changes I made.
Great Grey Owl -stage 4
Stage 4 shows the beak changed, I totally moved the angle of it and lengthened it! (see the enlargements below of these final stages too) If you take a damp brush and gently re-wet an area, and only the area you want to fix, you can then repeatedly rub it gently with a damp brush tip, blot it with a clean paper towel (I prefer Viva!) then clean your brush, wipe it off and repeat. Do this over and over, you’ll be amazed at how much you can lift. When I repainted the beak I thought like an oil painter, I laid down a more opaque yellow layer to clean and brighten the beak, then I kept putting washes over this dry layer to affect the color. It ended up with an unusual translucent look like a real beak would have.
As I did this, of course I started to notice other areas I wanted to improve upon. Sigh…such is the plight of an artist with a picky eye! Notice the area of light tan below his beak, I needed to bring out the lightness of it so I added white watercolor to some cad.yellow, and browns to create a tint for an underlayer. Another note about this painting, next time I will pick a much smoother paper, working with this much detail you need to keep your paper super smooth with no distracting texture.
Great Grey Owl -stage 5
Stage 5 shows how I painted detail on top of the tan area under the beak and the beak has more details added. The owl has an overall lighter look, this is because I kept stroking on little feathers with a tint of whitish blue grey to add detail. Now I thought I was done here, but remember that boyfriend of mine with the good eye? Well he helped me notice I had painted out the nostril! SIGH….yes, when I was adding the little hairs by the beak I must have done that so back to the easel. The picture at the beginning of the post is the final stage, fixed and finished!
Working with my magnifying glasses
This is me working with my reading glasses on and a little set of clip on magnifier lenses. In the photo I have the magnifying lenses lifted up so I can look at the paints in front of me, if they were down I’d need to get much closer to see what I was doing. So I would lift the lenses up when I would sit back a bit and take a look at the ‘whole’ painting and the photo, looking for areas that need attention. Then I’d flip them back down and get close for the detail painting. I wouldn’t use them for the initial stages of painting, you don’t want to focus on details at that point.
Also you notice here my setup is different than before, I have another pan of watercolors and have them set up on some jars so they are closer to my painting. Working with a tiny brush ( 10/0 liner) it dries out super fast and keeping my pallet nearer seemed to help. The nice thing about working on a miniature painting was being able to mix small amounts of color right in the pan lid. (the brush in the picture is not my liner brush)
The pictures below are so you can look at one section close up to see the changes I made to the beak and area around it.
Great Grey Owl close up detail stage 3
Great Grey Owl close up detail stage 4
Great Grey Owl close up detail stage 5
Great Grey Owl -close up detail finished
I hope you’ve enjoyed my post about my painting. I looked forward to showing you my mistakes and how I fixed things as I painted because this is how it goes, it’s a process and doesn’t always go as easy as it looks. I like to encourage my students and others to keep looking at their paintings for more detail but most of all a good beginning drawing is crucial. As you can see here, I missed the beak angle and had to fix it later, but the more you paint and draw the better you’ll be at catching these things in your work. That’s my two cents! Please leave me some comments and if you are interested in note card or prints please let me know.
For the fun of it, here’s some Utube links with owls!
A Valentines Day bouquet from your sweetie is very nice…smells so sweet, warms your heart..but doesn’t last forever no matter what you do. Unless you get out your paints and do some studies! After a week of enjoying the blooms…then watching some slowly fade, I picked out the freshest ones and moved them into another vase up to my studio. As I did the tulips dropped their petals in a flourish, woosh…all over the table. I picked some up and looked at them, thinking how beautiful their individual forms and colors were.
I decided to do studies of the petals and laid them on my paper with a strong little lamp above me. I should have titled this post “How to Paint Through Pain”…that is, how to cope with painting while in pain. I painted these on the floor, my lower back has been hurting and sitting in a chair was too much to bear. So, I put it on the floor and kept moving around…kneeling, laying on my stomach…what ever I could. I got a bit messy with some areas of these studies, but then it was hard to concentrate! I started each with a basic gesture of the shape very lightly drawn with pencil. The shadows were the most fun to paint, studying the colors coming through the petals. A tip here, to keep the petals fresh until you’re ready to work, put them in a ziplock sandwich bag with a sprinkle of water, then put them in the refrigerator. Tell everyone NOT to eat them!!
Oh yes, the other thing is I did them with just my waterbrush…see above picture. You can see the petals laying on my paper and waterbrush in my hand. (PS. this was really late at night…actually I think it was 1am!)
So now I can look at the little study and always remember my Valentines surprise bouquet! I wish I had time to do more studies..I had planned to, but you know how that goes!
Today as the sun shone and the temperatures climbed to a balmy 30 or so degrees, I felt a very strong urge to just grab my field kit and go for a hike with Ginger. I notice whenever I go out field sketching or work on a painting in the studio, it’s like having a visit to the therapist! I feel like I’ve just had some kind of adjustment, and all is right in my world! Troubles melt away as I stop to catch my breath and listen to the wind gusting through the trees. Today was no different. (click on any picture to see enlarged view)
First small sketch done with a micron 05 permanent marker, it’s along the path that’s called “Long Lane” on my farm. To warm up and to see if drawing with my fingerless mittens would feel comfortable, I did the top of a small oak tree, then turned and looked down the lane where Ginger was disappearing down, and did a quickly scrawled sketch. It’s ok that it’s not beautiful and meticulously drawn, I can remember the scene in my mind just be looking at it. Sometimes the field sketch can have more movement and show more excitement than a carefully executed studio drawing. I also find that being able to work loosely in the field keeps my studio painting fresh and lively looking.
Just me in my dad’s old wool hunting coat that I treasure, using the fingerless mitten ok. I picked up this pair in England at a regular clothes store at the mall, I made sure they had wool in them, and I like the dark brown color (to hide the dirt of course silly!). At this point I think my fingers were cold, sometimes I worked with the top pulled back and sometimes closed. I’m using a waterbrush here and watercolors, I put my kit in a new bag to try out, an over the shoulder binder type thing, but no room for apples or water bottles. Extra things had to go in the back secret pouch on the hunting jacket, made for carrying dead birds that the hunter (dad) would shoot. It’s actually a handy pouch…I slid my sketchbook in there when I would get moving on my hike.
This is a page with a simple color study of the red bark on bushes and the little fern heads coming up through the snow. Their forms, almost silhouette because they’re so dark, are wonderful to study.
The photo above shows a leaf I found in a tiny birds nest that was tucked into a tangled bush. It’s small things like this that if you take time to notice the subtle beauty your enjoyment of the natural world and simple walks would be much more memorable. This leaf is a simple shape, but I love the mixture of subtle colors, there’s a promise of green there that makes me think of spring, it’s almost as if the green was frozen from the fresh times of summer. The pattern of the veins and cells is really something too, the wet sheen on it’s surface reflecting a cool light.
Then turn the same leaf over and it’s a whole other leaf! This side has a network of raised veins showing, like fine meshwork netting and the contrast of the color of vein to leaf is at once noticed. The fall like colors are not showing on this side. When you pick something up, turn it over and explore everything about it; if you draw it, you will study it deeply, noting it’s every interesting detail. Sometimes this is good to do once you get back home and can sit in the warmth and take time to study it.
Here’s another nest I found that almost looks like it has an ice cream scoop for an egg waiting to be hatched by the warm spring sun. (It’ll have to wait awhile still!) Walking in winter is a good time to look for birds nests, just look at bushes or trees for clumps of dark areas, usually made by leaves and small branches. It’s fun to look closely at them, how the tiny branches are laid criss cross and woven, and imagine two birds picked up ever single twig and made that. Some nests are tiny things..some larger and could even be for grey squirrels. I don’t ever disturb the nests…I feel they are there to be used somehow by other creatures, mice, bugs, etc. and I just let it alone. I will carefully pull some leaves out of a nest to see what the cup might look like.
Now this page has notes you can read, but I’ll explain a bit more. I went to a part of my land that has huge old oak trees on it, and one in particular that is dead. This dead tree had all kinds of funguses growing on it and was great to study.
I learned something new that I didn’t expect, there was an interesting type of fungus growing on the underside of all the large branches. It was a beautiful natural yellow with some orangey colors in it, but very muted. The funny thing was I noticed the snow beneath it had yellow spots following the branches, NO Ginger didn’t do that! haha…but as the snow piled on top of the branches melted, the yellow color in the fungus was dripping down to the ground. I wonder if the Indians or settlers used that as a color for something?
Here’s a close up, if anyone can help me identify this I’d be grateful. I looked it up in my mushroom and fungus books but can’t find it specifically.
This fungus is as far as I can tell, a “Redbelt” shelf fungus. I did a painting in the field while looking at it and looked it up when I got home. (The painting is below). The odd thing was, as closely as I thought I looked at this, I still missed something interesting. When I got home and uploaded my photos, I noticed on some close ups there were little blackish bugs crawling all over the place!! Ewww….I have to admit, I like studying bugs, but the idea that there were bugs all over this fungus and tree and I didn’t know it kind of made me uneasy! But the fascinating thing was that there were bugs out doing their thing in the middle of the winter! You would be surprised at what you’ll see on a mild winter day!At this point, at the end of my hike after being out two hours, my toes were frozen and getting numb. This is when the idea of hot cocoa creeps into my mind and Ginger’s happy face asking, “Can we go home yet?” starts to distract me.
This last page I finished at home while drinking that hot cocoa; the tree and fungus I did in the field. I brought home a stick with neat fungus growing on it, the leaf I photographed and a dead leaf. This stick was very interesting to look at under a magnifying glass, the black fungus was shiny and the rose colored had a velvety sheen almost. I made a stab at identifying the rose colored as Hypoxylon Fragiforme, any experts out there can verify this? I added color notes too so you could see what paints I used.
I hope you enjoyed our hike today in the winter chill! Sign up your email in the right column to recieve updates when I post new things. Happy Hiking!
Well I decided that I’d concentrate on birds of prey amongst all the other nature stuff I’m painting. It’s great to concentrate on a particular subject for awhile; you’ll learn more information as you read about it, visit locations where it can be studied in real life and ask questions of those who know more than you about your subject.
This little (3.5″x3.5″) watercolor painting is a warm up for a larger painting I want to do in oil. I am working from photographs by my photographer friend Gene Witkowski (of Buffalo) from when we went to the Sterling Renaissance Festival three years ago. (wow has it been that long??) After that I became a full time artisan there but never had time to go visit the acts and see the owls or joust first hand. So now I use the invaluable photos. The oil painting I’m going to do is a full size pose of this owl named Boo, sitting on the gloved hand of his owner Jenn, who did the bird of prey show.
She told me he was an African Eagle Owl, now that I read about the Eagle Owls, I’ve learned he is indeed an Eurasian Eagle Owl (Bubo bubo) and that the ones found in Africa would be smaller and greyer as he is. I wondered because as I read about them it says they are brown mostly, and mine was not. Another fact I never knew, our Great Horned Owl is an Eagle Owl, Cool!
Below shows my set up as I worked, I put a masonite drawing board on top of a tv tray table and this is where I plunk myself sometimes to work near the woodstove. Ahhhh, you can’t beat that heat when it’s freezing outside! I limited myself to my field palette of watercolors and yes, I had to use the reading glasses! An invaluable tool when working on tiny paintings!
In this post I bring you two owls, both are Barn Owls but look very different. The first is a sketch of a Barn Owl from the United States, the typical light heart shaped face and brown markings on the feathers. I think the same species is what you see in the UK, but theirs are slightly different in color or size. I need to research this further! (a note from me…I did put this up in a post back in August, but this shows it scanned in much clearer and the framed version.)
I used watersoluble graphite (graphitint) color pencils to do it, and a waterbrush to blend and make washes with the drawn lines. The property I like about watercolor type pencils is how you can leave the drawn lines if you like, it give a certain texture. If you don’t like that, just rub it a little more with the brush tip and it will all go to wash. The original sketch is only 2.5″ x 3.5″ big; it’s already been sold but I do have mini framed prints of it available, note cards and 8×10 handsigned prints. The original sketch is only 2.5″ x 3.5″ big; it’s already been sold but I do have mini framed prints available (shown below), note cards and 8×10 handsigned prints. This owl below is an Ashy Faced Barn Owl, an owl I never heard of until I visited the Kielder Water Bird of Prey Centre in Northumberland England. The owner let me take pictures of their owl, telling me it’s an uncommon bird even in England. It’s a young owl, you can see some of the down poking out from the feathers still. It’s dark face contrasted by it’s golden feathers were fascinating to look at! I looked it up in my two huge owl books and can’t find it in there, time to research this one more also!
This tiny painting was done exclusivly with watercolors and a tiny brush, it measures 2.5″ x 3″. The original has sold but I have tiny framed prints (shown below) available and note cards. Just email me to inquire: mary@marymcandrew.com
Today was my second day at Muncaster Castle. I’ve uploaded a video for you to listen to at the end of this post, don’t miss it!
I was invited by Patrick Gordon-Duff-Pennington to visit he and his wife Philida for coffee in the morning at the castle, they are the couple who own the stately castle. How wonderful does that sound? I was also invited to bring my sketch book and my prints to share with them. Patrick had to meet with the woodsman who oversees the property so Philida, a wonderful person to share time with, and I sat on a silk covered couch in the library and enjoyed hot tea. We chatted about my artwork and the castle. The picture below shows some of the library, it was filled with wonderful paintings, antiquities and memorabilia. I like the miniature chairs on the table. Since it was before the general public was allowed in, I was left to wander freely about the library on the ‘other’ side of the rope! I wish I had a whole week to spend wandering around and drawing the interior of the castle. Below is a little painting I did while up on the balcony of the library. The library is round and if you look up you’ll see there is a balcony with iron railings that goes all around it way up above. Well I was given a big old ancient key and told that I could use it to unlock the door to the balcony at my leisure! I did go up there and it was a little scary, you had to watch your step, the floor boards were old and the ramp around was quite narrow! But I’m adventurous…I wanted to explore! About the little painting, I had my painting kit on my waist, my small field palette, little bottle of water, small brushes and held the sketchbook while I worked. I set some things on the window sill and looked out over the valley through the very old and very drafty windows. It was blowing up a gale and very chilly outside, so I was glad to be in. This is a cherub statue with more antiquities and wonderful stained glass. I was walking down the stairs, a wide expanse of marble…and tourists were milling about with wonder in their eyes, and appeared Patrick. Patrick is a talented poet bard…and not shy. He stood on the stairs of their castle and recited one of his wonderful poems to all the visitors. He is genuinely interested in all who visit his castle! Another view out a window in the great hall, everywhere you turned there were beautiful things to look at.
Then I picked a window just outside the billiard room to draw. I was in a narrow hall way outside it, so people were walking by, but I stood up as I drew this with my charcoal pencils, a stiff brush and tortillion. It was so chilly, but one of the ladies that worked at the castle, Candy, brought me hot tea! How nice was that? Very nice!! The perspective on this window was tricky, you have to remember when drawing NOT to draw what you think, but what you SEE, in the end it will (or should) come together. It’s funny how when you stop to draw other people stop and look, wondering at what is so interesting! I like the way the blustery clouds came out through the window. This last photo is from the Tapestry room and shows a Tudor carved fireplace, it commemorates the victory over the Spanish Armada. I just loved looking at all the carvings throughout the castle. I really do wish I had more time to draw what I saw, but relied on taking photos to use later for drawing. This is a video clip taken at my window sill which overlooked the owl yard…every morning I was greeted by the song of a European Robin singing.
Imagine the most beautiful valley you can. The mountains surrounding the valley are covered with rusty reds of Bracken changing color in the fall, and rich, deep greens from the excessive rains and some parts have exposed rock face a pink tint in certain light. Now imagine a perfect winding lazy river meandering across it’s deep valley and the view from where you stand is so perfect, you can see for miles down it’s center, the distant mountains turning blue with the atmospheric mists. Now you look up and realize there are Buzzards (Hawks) flying up the valley, floating on the drafts that carry them.
You turn and look just behind you and there is a great castle, standing like a strong old soldier. This is Muncaster Castle, built in 1258 partly on Roman foundations. A Roman coin from AD380 was found there!
So, onto my adventure! You can see below I’m standing on the road that winds around the castle, sketching the view of the valley. My art kit is strapped to my waist, at the ready to grab my waterbrushes or pencils, and my backpack with extra supplies in case I need them, including my 35mm camera, rain pants, extra art suppies and snacks.
Below you can click on my sketchbook page to read the notes I wrote. I talked about my first English Breakfast, and my first impression upon seeing the castle. I was surprised when I turned the bend and saw it, wow! The color scribbles on the page are just that, I was testing out colors there for another sketch.Below, here I am now sitting at the top of Cannon Bank, the castle is right behind me again. I did the small watercolor below the picture, working with my little travel palette. It’s from this bank that every afternoon they feed the wild herons…more on that later.
The “Eskdale Valley and Muncaster Bridge”
Below is a view of the back of the Castle, I’m now headed up the hill for a walk into the expansive woods. There are 1,800 acres with the property, I think that’d keep me busy exploring for awhile!
This is a great shot of a back door into the castle, what a great drawing this will make!
Everyday they hold an owl demonstration behind the castle, with the birds being flown to educate people about them. I think this might be an Eagle Owl.
I added this picture just so you could see (and enjoy) the fantastic wing span of this beautiful bird. Here is another page from my sketchbook, not too many sketches here, but lots of notes about what I was seeing. I then headed into the Owl Center they have on the grounds to take pictures. I listed the owls I photographed for further reference.
Next..well you gotta eat sometime! I sat and had a most enjoyable hot lunch after all that exploring. There is a phenomenal cafe on the property with so many choices. I tried the carrot and marrow soup because I never heard of marrow and it’s an English vegetable. It was great!
I have notes on the page about meeting the owner of the castle himself! Please read it and see!
As the day wound down I took an adventurous walk down the hill along a path that I had no idea where it went. All I know is it went down and I was curious to see if it got anywhere near that gorgeous valley? I had my trusty L.L. Bean rain hat with light in the brim so I could see if it got dim, and with the surroundings always noted, I began. The photo below shows the ‘picture perfect’ top of the hill path, this is a painting waiting to happen!
The path meanders down from there…crossing a noisy little brook on a wooden bridge, and many large stone pavers.
I made it all the way to the bottom and walked off to the left following the path. It ended suddenly at a big metal gate and the view I had was wonderful, yes it was my valley floor I was looking for! There were sheep grazing in the distance and as the light faded I did a small sketch with my watercolor pencils. It was getting chilly and hard to draw as my hands were stiff, I saw a bat flying overhead and then….the clock tower bell tolled 8 times…eight o’clock, time to pack up and go before it gets dark suddenly and I can’t find my way back!
I don’t have a picture or drawing to tell about the last adventure of the day but it was exciting. After dark, I grabbed my 35 mm camera and tripod and headed outside. It was pitch black and not a soul was about, absolutely quiet! I wanted to play around with getting some photos of the sky, it was just full of stars! I heard a deep hooting from the owl pens just near me in the owl center, I imitated it and then…I heard the same call answer but not from the pens…but from up the hill in the woods!! How cool is that?! I tried to imitate it as best I could and we called back and forth.
After this I walked down to the side of the castle that looks over the valley. In total blackness I sat on the same bench that I had sat upon that day, listening to the sounds of the night. I heard a very large bird (of prey) give an alarm call from the woods below. If I hadn’t ventured out at night, I would have missed so much!
Please come back for the next post about Muncaster, I have so much more to tell!
This is a watercolor study I did to as a demonstration for my fall Nature Sketching and Painting Indoor class that just finished up. I used it to show the stages it took to make a simple study, step by step, layering washes, values etc. Posted below are the steps it took to make this 5″x5″ study head, be sure to click on pictures to see larger views! Enjoy!
Detailed sketch – Shown below, first I started with a light gesture sketch of the shape of the bird, then rechecked placements of things and refined details.
Darkest Darks-This is one approach to watercolors, start by laying in your darkest darks and blacks. If you start with a confident sketch it should work out fine, when you work this way you set out from the beginning with a defined dark end of the value range. You can then judge all other values against it as you paint. You won’t have to go back and keep “pushing” your darks to make them pop.
I also painted the eye, being carful not to touch the highlight area, black for the pupil, and brown put into the wet black for the iris. (I think I put my reading glasses on for this step! haha).
Below I started to lay in more darks of the cheek, as my brush was drying out I would ’sketch’ areas I wasn’t sure about…just to start to lay in some value so I could see where I wanted to paint. Color Wash-Here I laid in a bluish grey, ultramarine and black thinned with water. After it dried I laid in some small lines for feathers.
Changeing the drawing- A pale yellow ochre wash on skin of eye area and nares. A wash over the eye highlight to tone it down and soften it. Here I also made a decision about the beak, now that I was putting values down, I thought the beak looked a bit too heavy. So before committing to paint, I erased! I reworked the curve then I painted keeping all areas soft and blended slightly. Feather details-I brushed on more feather details here, laid in more darks with repeated ‘feather’ strokes to top of head and all around eye. Nice spotty look at right edge, I like when the watercolor can been seen for what it is, it gives it a looseness. See the photo below for this step, just repeated tiny strokes. Yellow of beak and eye-Here I laid in the yellow on the nares and eye area, and it’s completed! See it on my Art Gallery Blog soon with prices for note cards and prints!
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