Loosing count of the days! But at least these are posted in sequential order- backwards!
Today will be a little different. I want to take a moment and talk about some good habits to build. First is keeping a sketchbook.
When I first decided I wanted to tell visual stories I realized I had no skill want so ever and very very little talent. (Yes you CAN learn it all!) So I had to buckle down and really work to learn the craft of making pictures. (Some day maybe I will post my early attempts..)
I started by doing 2 activities 1. carrying sketchbook everywhere with me in order to capture what inspired me and to try out ways of depicting it and 2. drawing anything that was still long enough (and yes especially naked bodies. One cant cheat when drawing them!
I am on my umtenth sketchbook..and just starting a new one. When its time for this going back through the finished one is very telling — I also take out key ideas and put them in the new one. In the above picture you can see sketches, color paint notes as well as notes from a book on classical painting I have been studying.
This morning I spent thinking back on the walk I took with my mom yesterday in the wilds of SChoodic trying to remember what ‘struck’ me. This is such a valuable exercise for it will increase your visual memory. Go somewhere in your home or outside if you are lucky enough to be able to do that right now and really observe something— anything it can be your big toe! then try sketching it. Think about big patterns not the tiny wrinkles. Think about the light and the dark shapes not the outlines…
And lastly make a value chart. This is one I have done in oil paint – bottom is grey scale top is for Verdaccio painting. Without values there is no sketching or drawing or painting. The Literati Asian Painters believed that a good painting was only in black, white and gray and had at least 5 values.
Use this information in your sketching to reveal form. These value strips have become so important to my work that they are now taped on the cover of my new sketchbook along with the picture of Hondo….. who left us last month.
Send me what you do!