French Gray from red and blue

Well, my prismacolors came. No more excuses for not doing my colored pencil homework, well, aside from the excuse that I have no clue how to draw folds.

Back to the internet which is sprinkled with tutorials and utube entries. I think my rendering looks somewhat like the kleenex I crumpled.  And my french gray from red and blue worked fairly well, It wasn't till I saw the photo that I could see how the blue seems to dominate. I will have to work on that!

By the way, I added a pan and some carrots and onions to my previous drawing of an egg on a tshirt. Maybe only I see it as a turkey, but it made me feel good to trivialize it!

Turkeys and Thumbs

I  can't help it. Every time I look at this I think of a raw turkey ready to be stuck in the oven.  I have been meaning to try again, but then I look at this in despair.   Maybe it is switching to a t shirt instead of using a man's handkerchief like the thumbnails we did in class.  ( link to thumbnails )

At any rate, my new pencils are on order and I am hoping they will come before my Monday colored drawing class and I can make a better French Gray.  Yup ... when in doubt, blame the tools!

Fun email today from weeklyartlesson.com --- Lillian Kennedy explained the origin of the term thumbnail and says somebody someplace used to draw his ideas on his thumbnail.  With my fading vision, I am afraid that is an impossibility, I have trouble enough just seeing my thumbnail to clip the nail but it was a fascinating thought.

Drawing Class

I am taking a colored pencil drawing class at the art center - and we spent the first hour of class creating "french gray" from colored pencils. She said that you would get a depth of color by using 2 complementary colors that you don't get by using grays. So we layered and layered.

Creating French Gray with complementary colors

There's more than one way to sketch an egg ...

I found this site which also talks about making grays ... and a whole lot more.

We did thumbnail sketches of an egg on a white cloth - she explained the rule of thirds and sweet spots.

Then I started looking for tutorials on drawing eggs ... and of the thousands, I liked the finished look on this one, but not the way it was filmed.

The trouble with never having had art classes is that the simplest thing, like drawing a 3D object, sends me to the internet for tutorials.  But there sure is a lot of support to be found!

Our homework is to create a 6 x 8 composition of an egg on a cloth using colored pencils but ending with gray tones.

Balloon Fest

Woke up to the sound of hot air balloons overhead.

David's Birthday card

I don't think David watches this blog, so he won't see the birthday card I made for him today. Now if I can get his presents wrapped and in the mail, I will be all set.

Hmmm. Wonder how I got old enough to have a 35 year old son.

hmmm. I think I need to practice!

A fun find on utube

I discovered a tutorial for drawing petunias while googling "botanical drawings" and came up with what I consider a pretty decent petunia myself!   Check out Val Webb for some fantastic inspiration.

Here is the link for the petunia.



I am adding her to my morning muse list for sure!

Barb's Birdhouses

These birdhouses were up at my friend Barb's place at the Cape. I am not sure if the hurricane took them down or not.