Sketchbook Sunday #1

Hello!  I had an idea.  You know how I was doing 'Sunday Snapshots' religiously here for 6 years at least?  Well, all that dedicated photography was time well spent.  It certainly did help me to develop my eye for composition.  Practice always makes better.  However, I'm feeling like anything I go on to show you will be more of the same old, same old.  Since sitting down with Heidi Hunter six months ago, I apparently have caught a bit of her sketching bug.  She's GOOD!!!  Me?  Not so much, but the love and passion and intrigue is there.  Recently, my whole family went out to acquire new sketchbooks.  Now on Sundays, we try to discipline ourselves to sketching at least once per week. That tends to be a Sunday at the big dining room table.  It's wonderful!  We are learning so much from each other, and slowly coming into our own as we try out different things.

Without further adieu, WELCOME to my new 'Sketchbook Sunday" posts!  So far, I have been filling books (YES!  I filled an entire book!!!) with Blind Contour Line drawings.  That is the method of looking at a subject, following it with your eyes, and having your hand move the pen in the same motions that your eye moves - without looking at the pen or paper.  We did it a lot in highschool and I've always gotten a kick out of the perfect yet disjointed drawings that result.  It's always nice when training yourself to draw better is also entirely enjoyable.

Here are some examples...

Sketchbook Sunday, blind contour

This Sketchbook Sunday page was done from a gardening book in my collection.  I love to use it as a reference in my studio.  I flipped to the Blanket Flowers and thought those would be fun to do in ink as blind contour.  Later, I looked, and added the leaves and stems.  Then with pencil crayon, I coloured them in.  I used 4 greens, 3 reds and two yellows.  I love them!

At the top of the page is a blind drawing of a bit of lacy purple wisteria, which was later also coloured in.  I did this early in the morning today as part of 'Fake Journal Month'.  (What's that?  Go here.)

And if you think you'll miss my Sunday Snapshots, then I'll leave you with this.  It's a glamour shot of my sketchbook page with a little morning light.  xoxo

Have a lovely spring day.  Be creative!