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Veterans Memorial Hall

Yesterday my sketch attempt turned into a drawing 😉 and I didn’t mind it one bit, as a matter of fact time went by so fast.  I spent about 30mins doing this drawing, the eraser was not used (didn’t have it with me) just tried to figure the angles and then darken the lines and add some more detail.

Materials: Strathmore sketchbook and Tombow Mono 100 HB

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American Film Institute – 100 Years – 100 Movies

A couple of years ago I came across the American Film Institute list of 100 years 100 movies (PDF), and off an on I have attempted to watch all of them. The list I used apparently has been updated, they now have added new movies including Toy Story.

Back when I added the movies in Netflix not all of them were available but I believe there were about 80+ of them. I watched some when I was younger, so it was nice to be able to watch them again with a greater appreciation for what they have to offer.

Last few movies I have watched are:  The Miracle Worker, A Place in the Sun, Easy Rider, My Fair Lady and Sweet Smell of Success.

If you ever get a chance you may want to watch a few, it is interesting to see how some things just never change, while others do.

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Water Tower Sketch

Here is a water tower sketch I did during my lunch hour a week ago. I have seen this water tower for the past couple of years on the way to work, figured it was time to sketch it.

I saw the brick building and felt I should also add the bricks but then decided not to, I think there are times when we just want to do a quick sketch to capture the location and next thing we know it has become a drawing, with all the extra detail… and that is the challenge (at least in the beginning… what not to include).

For this sketch I used the Tombow Mono 100 HB pencil and I liked it.

Tools are tools right?  It is practice, practice, practice what allow us to improve!  Some say that it is not necessary to have better tools, other say that you might as well use them to get better results. I guess in the end it is a personal journey and perhaps one has to try both and see what works best.

Personally I think that if you can, you should use the nicer tools. I am still using student grade watercolors simply because I refuse to let them go to waste, once I am done with those I’ll move on to the artist grade. It just occurred to me that maybe I should try the nicer grade as well so I can see the difference, and I think I will try that next.

By the way I am looking for a nice pencil sharpener, if you have a favorite please share.

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SketchCrawl #22

April 11th, 2009 was held in Chinatown, San Francisco, CA. Unfortunately I was unable to attend 🙁 however I was able to do some sketching locally in downtown Santa Rosa.

First of all, it was a quiet Saturday perhaps because of the  Easter weekend. The first couple of sketches were done while I took our little dog for a walk, the cherry tree blossoms were dancing with the wind, and while standing there looking I noticed a branch that kept swinging up and down as the wind made  its presence known, after a couple of sketches my dog grew impatient so we moved on.

The rest of the sketches were done in downtown Santa Rosa. On the way to our destination, while crossing the street I sneezed, and to my surprise a passenger in a passing SUV said bless you which surprised me, because there have been situations where I am next to someone and then sneeze and they don’t say anything, or you say that to them and the same. That small token set the tone for the day!

I decided to sit at the edge of the park and observe / sketch people as they were walking by. It was quite an interesting exercise, people walked pretty fast, most had unhappy faces with no smiles, not one single person stopped to look and most seemed deep in their thoughts.

It was actually quite a challenge to sketch them because they were moving pretty fast (probably rushing to prepare for Easter) and while there were people sitting at a nearby restaurant patio, I decided to stick with the challenge of drawing moving targets.

The following events caught my attention so I decided to make a note of them. A couple went by (I didn’t sketch them), it was a woman with a man on a wheelchair who had a red  rose on his lap, I thought that was interesting, perhaps it was for his mother, or perhaps it was for his wife, his sister maybe? where are they going? to eat at that restaurant? maybe they are meeting someone there? who knows!!!  I found myself exploring the different potential options, which made this a lot more enjoyable than sketching buildings and landscapes which I typically do.

I also noticed a person drawing in the park, as I turned to see if there were other subjects behind me. He appeared to be using colored pencils, and yes I was curious to see what he may be doing.. I guess it is human nature, but opted to concentrate instead on my own sketching.

It was a great day!

The following video was created by Goro – this is what SketchCrawl is  ~ Enjoy ~

22nd SketchCrawl San Francisco from Goro on Vimeo.

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