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 Today, I felt a great urge to be outside, the weather was terrible for painting and drawing but actually not bad for a nice cold hike! The air was fresh, the wind steady but not too strong, and Ginger was very excited to go for a run. I used permanent ink fine point markers, no pencil for sketching and even tried out my watercolors. I must be crazy on such a cold day but I really felt like capturing some of the colors with some quick watercolor sketches. You can click on pictures to see the pages of my sketchbook close up or the photos. On the first page we had made it to the ‘maze’ an area of my land that I cut like a maze, and Ginger found something. I could tell it held great interest for her, it was scat (droppings) from I think a fox. Now don’t get grossed out, but any naturalist would record and study it, so I did. It was very full of hairs, probably from the rabbit it ate.
Then I did a quick study of the open field, mostly to capture color, not detail. Detail would be almost impossible in this cold wearing the huge, stiff leather gloves I had on! A flock of geese went over…I tried to catch them through the trees, and some lichens growing on stick in the icy water of the lane.
 
I think artists should show themselves in their environment, here I was, thoughtful, studying the land…umm freezing! ha! You can see I’m wearing my heavy coat with rain coat over that, wool hat, big gloves. I kind of like the little sketch of my big old ‘sister’ oak tree on the second page of the sketchbook. I’m looking across the field, where there’s the red barked bushes in front.
 
The third page I had frozen fingers by this time, you can tell by the loose, quick grasses I did. I also show a photo of how I held the sketchbook, palette, watercups and brush. In my hand of course, I also had picked up several ‘treasures’ to take back to the studio. I’m going to design a better way to hold a few brushes or pens, and the water. I was constantly on the move and this was too hard to handle with the gloves and weather. Did you notice the sarcastic note I wrote on my sketchbook about drawing with frozen fingers? At the end I was aggravated with struggling with my watercup lids so I just dipped my brush into the icy water at my feet. I tried not to swish it in where it was muddy and as I painted, it really was cold enough that I was getting icy crystals on my paper! YES, time for cocoa!
The last page of the sketchbook was done in the studio, I took more time to work from some of the ‘treasures’ I brought back. I drew most of it with a permanent fine point marker with no pencil sketch first. When you do this, it helps to make some little marks where you think your line will go before you commit to a solid drawn line. Pay attention to negative spaces especially on things like the center weed, it helped me to look at the spaces between the stems as I laid it out. Hope you enjoyed coming for a hike with me today at Long Lane Farm! ps. I drank two cups of cocoa to thaw out!
 Today I wanted to get outside without spending too much time thinking about it. Sometimes you can waste time just planning and packing so I kept it super simple. I took a gallon ziplock bag, my 6×8″ sketchbook, a tortillion, a small stiff brush, one small set of charcoal pencils (already in a clear pouch so I could grab them), and something new to me a set of “Cretacolor” leads or sticks with a lead holder. I have a bigger picture of them laying on my sketchbook pictured. The set comes with a 4b graphite stick, a white chalk, two shades of brown chalk, and sanguin? stick that is like a color pencil and doesn’t smear or blend easily.
I should have brought a simple pen for writing, hard to write with charcoal! oops! Next time. I wore these work gloves because they offered a bit of protection but they let me use my hands better than my heave work gloves! I use these when I do oil landscapes in the fall or spring when it’s still chilly. 
Something I’ve mentioned before, it’s when you really stop and be still for a time that you start to notice little things you might have missed before. Today I was setting my ziplock bag in the snow as I worked on drawing standing up. When I crouched down to retrieve something from my bag, I noticed a tiny, tiny bug on my bag. Then I noticed there were more tiny bugs on the snow under the dead Zinnias I was drawing. Then as I looked around, no kidding, they were all across the snow everywhere! Yikes, glad they were tiny, but it’s a sign of spring. I’m not sure what they were.
 Today I’m showing a page from my sketchbook that has drawings from two different days. At the top is a drawing of a dead sunflower head I did on Jan. 25th, on a very snowy, cold day! You can read what I wrote on the page about that. I was trying out my new Graphitint Color Pencils, this one is ‘cocoa’. After I sketched it, I used a waterbrush (brush with water stored in it) to pull the color out and create graded values of tone. Then I worked back into the dark areas to push the value range further and define the flower’s shape.
Today I found a green caterpillar when I picked up some bricks that were piled by my driveway, it was tucked in some rotting leaves and snow. I can’t imagine how caterpillars survive the winter like this. But he looked as fresh as springtime! Umm…so if you knew me, you’d already know I took him inside to draw and study!
The picture shows him lying on my sketchbook page. 1st I did a pencil sketch with the ‘outliner’ pencil that comes with the Inktense color pencils. I drew it at actual size then made an enlarged drawing that looks like he’s under a magnifying glass. The shadow and the magnifying glass make it look more real. Then I drew him again (small) and tried to add a cast shadow. This didn’t work out too well at this tiny size so I pulled the ink black color all around it to ‘fix’ it. I also show a picture of the sanding block I use to sharpen my colorpencils. I don’t keep a very long point on them because they are more prone to breaking then graphite. Click on the pictures to see enlarged views and read my notes on my sketchbook. 
 This is from my trip to the Buffalo Botanical Gardens on Jan. 11, 2008. I’m working from a photo of a stem with pink and green leaves, I still have to find out what kind of plant it is. It’s very pretty!
I’m working in an 8″x10″ sketch book, first I did a sketch with a mechanical pencil. I tried to scan my progress with the color pencils in stages. I’m working with my new Coloursoft Color Pencils from Derwendt and a few Prismacolor Color Pencils.
The bottom twig tip I outlined with a very fine point sharpie marker, then worked the CP in. I’m still not sure how I’ll approach the branch, I might do a watercolor wash then CP but the paper is pretty thin and it might not work too great. We’ll see!
 
 Me painting with sketchbook and watercolor palette in one hand. I decided to put that little travel watercolor palette to test. I picked up a gorgeous iris and lily yesterday, sketched it out and started the first stages of painting. My objective here was really to test out the palette, watercup arrangement and holding the light board all in one hand. I want to see if I can use it like this in the field without an easel for little studies. You can click on any picture to see enlarged views.
 My travel watercolor palette with watercups attached I show a close up of the arrangement so you can see the watercups; they are actually for holding mediums for oil painting, designed to hold the liquid even when tipped slightly on a hand held palette. They worked fantastic! I had to get over the habit of looking for my watercup on the table! You can see the ‘sticky tack’ or ‘blue tack’ in my palette. Yesterdays blog explained that better, so they get tested today and it worked wonderfully! Yay..two experiments that worked.My hand got a bit tired from holding the board and palette but this set up is supposed to be for quick studies, I worked on it longer than I would in the field.
The pictures are to show the stages of my painting, start to finish.
 Iris pencil sketch  starting to lay in some colors  Putting on the blues, make sure yellow is dry first  Adding more details now, layering on more blues  Adding final details and darker values  Finished! Click here to see Note Cards of this painting,
and Click here for magnets in my shop!
This is a watercolor I did of an iris that I approached spontaneously. No sketch, just direct painting with the brush, I did it rather quickly in a regular sketchbook (thin paper). I’ll have to get my chinese brushes out and ‘brush up’ with them, I used to paint everything with them!
This is a watercolor I did of the same iris as the previous post, but this time I approached it more spontaneously. No sketch, just direct painting with the brush, I did it rather quickly in a regular sketchbook (thin paper). I’ll have to get my chinese brushes out and ‘brush up’ with them, I used to paint everything with them!
Click on any picture to view larger. (the photos of me working are compiments of Daniel M. Cox, thanks Dan!)
Here are some photos, so hard to pick from so many beautiful flowers and plants! Here’s a link to their home page: http://www.buffalogardens.com/
Today I went for a hike with my dog Ginger, the weather was so warm I couldn’t resist! I think the temperature today reached 66 degrees! It’s very breezy, clouds and patches of sun. So we wandered and I pretty much descibed things on my journal pages. Just click on the pics of my sketchbook to read my notes and see the small sketches. This first page I did a very quick sketch (7 minutes), click on it.
This is a photo of me and Ginger, I set my tiny Olympus FE 230 digital camera on top of the fence post and did an auto timer shot. I have my mud boots on, my small three legged stool over my shoulder, and an over-size fanny pack from LL Bean.
I wasn’t sure about wearing the fanny pack in front,because I thought it’d make my back hurt, but actually it was ok. It was nice to have it right in front of me to keep tucking my sketchpad and pens into as I walked. My cell phone is clipped to my belt loop.
Page 2 of the journal…I found this great moss…so green for such a dreary time of year. It was growing all over the bottoms of the trees, it’s very wet on my land.
 ‘Memory Lane’ is so flooded I didn’t dare go there with leaky boots! But it still looks beautiful, all that water reflecting the sky, dry grasses, great color.
Page 3…I was picking up some dried oak leaves to take back home with me and saw a small spider on one leaf. It was so cool, looked like a little seed if you look quick. I did three little quick studies of it. It keeps raining off and on and I don’t have my rain coat.
This is my three legged stool I bought at Walmart in the hunting/fishing dept. This stool is great but when the ground is wet…um, well you kind of sink in when you sit on it!
This is the back side of a fern stem, the tiny leaves are actually curled up and look like seeds. I think it’s a ‘Sensitive Fern’.
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Today, I felt a great urge to be outside, the weather was terrible for painting and drawing but actually not bad for a nice cold hike! The air was fresh, the wind steady but not too strong, and Ginger was very excited to go for a run. I used permanent ink fine point markers, no pencil for sketching and even tried out my watercolors. I must be crazy on such a cold day but I really felt like capturing some of the colors with some quick watercolor sketches. You can click on pictures to see the pages of my sketchbook close up or the photos. On the first page we had made it to the ‘maze’ an area of my land that I cut like a maze, and Ginger found something. I could tell it held great interest for her, it was scat (droppings) from I think a fox. Now don’t get grossed out, but any naturalist would record and study it, so I did. It was very full of hairs, probably from the rabbit it ate.
