Drawings: OCA Part 3: Assignment 3

Assignment Three - Drawing Outdoors Final Piece

Graphite and Chalk on Coloured Paper

 

First off I have to say that this assignment was hard, or more specifically finding the right view to work from was the hard part. I needed a view from a window or doorway that included natural objects (i.e. plants, trees etc) had a sense of depth to demonstrate some perspective as well as some straight-lined objects. I found looking out of any window covered a couple of these criteria but they all seemed a bit, well, bland. So when I finally found this view I knew that this was the one I was going to work from, it had a linear perspective in the buildings and some trees in the foreground and the church gave an interesting background.

 

So, having found my chosen view I set about playing around with the composition and decided on a portrait format that I felt showed the depth of the drawing well. I then experimented with the perspective of the buildings to ensure that I had it all right. After this I decided to eliminate one of the background buildings and I am glad I did this as it helps the church to be more dominant in the background.

I experimented with a watercolour and pen drawing that I decided not to pursue, it did not feel like the right media for the piece; I wanted to work with something that showed off the setting better. After a bit more exploration I decided I really liked the way chalk and graphite worked against each other, especially on the coloured paper as a mid-tone. The media manages to capture something of the feel of the place quite well.

I ended up spending a couple of hours creating the final piece and I am really satisfied with the result. My only concerns are that I may have lost some of the depth in the final drawing and that I should have explored some more choices of media that may have showed certain elements off better.

Experimenting with Composition

Biro on Paper

 

Pencil Sketch (left) and Working out Perspective (right)

Watercolour and Pen Piece (left) and Charcoal Sketch of the Same Tree (right)

 

First try with Chalk and Graphite on Coloured Paper

Drawings: OCA Part 2: Assignment 2

Final Piece

Watercolour and Pencil - A3 

For this assignment I knew I wanted to produce something full of colour, so I started playing around with drawing and sketching different pieces of fruit like onions and chillies, trying out different media as I went.

I initially really liked the idea of the chillies and went ahead with the idea, adding in some green herbs to enhance the colour and using the same view point (from above) that I thought worked well in the fish on plate piece from earlier in the project. I like these pieces but having reviewed the criteria for this assignment again, I was not confident that I had really completed it as well as I could with the composition or colour, probably because I rushed into doing it.

I was not particularly enthusiastic about doing another ink piece at this point so I went back and tried using a combination of pencil and watercolour on some small drawings of fruit. I really liked the way these turned out so I continued with this idea. I also thought a lot longer about the composition I would use, sketching out different ideas first. I added a simple jug that had quite a natural curve like the fruit and eventually a pot plant at the back that gave the arrangement some height and presence. Once I had finalised the composition I produced a couple of studies to make sure I was happy with the lighting and positioning of the all the items and then started on the final piece.

I first sketched the whole thing out in pencil, ensuring that the scale and shading was right. I used the cross-hatching method because I knew it would help to define the shapes well. With the watercolour, I built up layers of separate tones, building it up most where the darker tones were present and leaving the highlighted parts almost bare. It took quite a while to do it this way but I am fairly pleased with the result.

 Study of Red Onions

Watercolour and Biro - A4

 

Initial Studies and Sketches

 

 

First result that I was not happy with

 

 

Starting Over with some Watercolour Studies

 

Playing around with Composition

 

Practice before Final Piece

Watercolour and Pencil

 Pros:

-          My favourite thing about this piece is definitely the colours; I specifically choose the lemons, limes and satsumas because I thought the colours contrasted well, giving each piece of fruit its own separate form.

-          The cross-hatching works well to define the shapes.

Cons:

-          Despite all the planning for it, I’m still not entirely happy with the composition; I think I preferred it in some of the study pieces as opposed to the final drawing.

-          Looking at it now I think I should have thought more about filling in the background to give the piece a better setting.

Woodland Watercolour

Watercolour on A4 Cartridge Paper

I found this piece that I created a while ago, last spring if my memory serves me well, and thought it was quite an interesting artwork. I remember consciously trying to be uninhibited with the colour; if I got the feeling of a colour being present in the view I endeavoured to add it without hesitating.

 I personally find it really intriguing how if you really look at something, especially natural landscapes, you begin to see all sorts of colours you would never imagined would be present. It is taken for granted that leaves are green and trees trunks are brown, but they never really are.

Whether I succeeded in my attempts with this I am not entirely sure but nevertheless, as a piece of art, I really quite like it.



Paintings: Ruined Window Watercolour

Watercolour and Indian Ink on A4 Cartridge Paper

So I am once again back and blogging once more and I thought I would start this new blogging year with this piece featuring a ruined church window. I created this artwork a while ago and I liked it because  it was all overgrown with ivy, the trees were growing though the window and plants were clinging onto the rocky walls; it already seemed like a piece of art before I even started to draw it.

I worked with some watercolour tablets and Indian ink on this artwork, consciously using quite vibrant colours to try and convey a subtle reminder of stained glass. I am not sure if this worked, you will have to decide for yourselves on that, but I am definitively pleased with the finished result anyway.

Sketchbook: A Wintery Watercolour Tree

Watercolour in A5 Sketchbook

I’m being a bit inconsistent with my last post, but this time I thought I’d be faithful to the current season and put up a rather more wintery looking piece. This maple tree caught my eye with its bare branches looking almost skeletal, just looking at it makes me feel cold and shivery.

This was just a quick sketchbook piece so I used watercolours, sticking to yellow ochre for the light patches and a dark brown for the shadowy tones.

Back Catalogue: An Eerie Ruin in Watercolour and Mixed Media

Mixed Media on Cartridge Paper

Been a while since I put anything up on this blog, I shall try not to leave it so long in the future.

This is a piece I created a while ago as part of a project on Ruin and Decay that I think I have mentioned in one or two previous posts. I chose this ruined tower that I believe was part of a castle keep perched on top of a little hill as the subject for a mixed media painting. It had quite a serious, almost spooky feel to the place that I wanted to try and communicate in this piece.

I went quite ambitious with the scale of this piece being just a little bit smaller than A1 size. I roughly plotted out all the bits of shadows and darker areas in some Indian ink and then diluted some more to create a wash. When I was happy with this layer I proceeded to work into it with some watercolour paints, trying not being too strict with my palette. I also added some marks in crayons and some chalk, and finished it off with some last details in ink with a thin brush.

Sketchbook: Still Life Watercolour

Watercolour on A5 Cartridge Paper

This is the first Still life piece I have featured on this blog and the first that I have done for quite a while. I used a small branch and a sprig of something I discovered in my garden; trying to avoid a very cliché still life I arranged the two bits in a rather ugly plastic soft drinks bottle. Although I didn’t want it to look like a typical still life, I did want it to allude to one, which I think this has achieved.

I used watercolours on this piece as it was only intended as a quick study to begin with. I limited my palette to mostly cool colours, pairing the hues of blue and green in the bottle and the green sprig on the left. The only warm colours used were a touch of red brown and yellow ochre in the branch on the right.

Sketchbook: Some Seasonal Spruces

Watercolour in A5 Sketchbook

Autumn seems to be speeding along at quite a pace so while we are still in the midst of it I thought I would capture a little bit of this all too short-lived season in my sketchbook with this warm watercolour painting of a line of leafy autumnal trees in the park.

I employed a limited palette of some typically warm autumnal reds and yellow ochre’s for the majority of this sketchbook piece, as it was intended as just a quick composition to look back on for future work. However, having completed it, I am quite pleased with the ultimate result. It is quite a simple representation, I didn’t try to capture anything more detailed than a fleeting impression of the subject but there is something in the simplicity of it that I appreciate and regard as quite engaging.

P.S. I googled it and apparently these trees aren't technically spruces but then my alliterative title wouldn't have worked.

Some Arboreal Botherations

Watercolour on A2 Cartridge Paper

I used watercolour to create this piece of a lonely oak tree on the side of a slope. I went slightly mad with this piece, incorporating any colour or means of applying the paint that took my fancy.

I started with the main trunk of the tree, deciding against including a distinct background of any sorts, so I sketched it all out in a light burnt sienna. Then I filled in much of the main trunk and the thicker branches with various brown hues adding touches of sap green to give the impression of some mossy patches clinging onto the bark. I also gave a slight hint of the hill upon which this oak tree grew with a faint wash of sap green at the base to give this tree something to grasp on to. I was quite pleased at this stage, but then I started on the foliage and that’s were it started to go downhill in my opinion.

I started on the leaves with another sap green wash, like with the hill at the tree base and then suggesting some more frondescent details using a hookers green applied with a rigger brush. I was still quite happy at this stage, but this is where I began to go a little bit crazy with the colour. I thought I would give it a more autumnal mood by utilising some warmer pigments to the foliage with some cadmium yellows, oranges and a light red. I applied these colours by flicking them onto the surface with an old toothbrush dipped into the mixed colours in the hope that it would add little flourishes. I’m not totally convinced this has worked but I don’t think the piece is a complete disappointment, and others have said they liked it so maybe my efforts with this piece were not completely wasted in vain.