Brown Paper Drawings #1 & #2

Even though my vision is poor, I had the bright idea to make a brown paper book. Pencil lines disappear on this paper. Ink lines are questionable. Colors are chosen by what is printed on the pencil. Fun times.

That is the most stupid owl I have ever seen. It is an insult to all owls. Sadly, I will admit the drawing is mine.

More tree practice. I'm actually getting a little more comfortable with trees.

Buildings 12 & 13

Door Knockers and a Castle

My practice sketchbook for buildings has been sadly neglected, but here are two recently completed pages. The castle was easier to draw than the door knockers.

Buildings 10

The original isn't loaded with 90-degree angles, so my perspective isn't as bad as it seems.

Original image from the WetCanvas! Image Library.

Buildings 08

So, I like arches.

Original image from the WetCanvas! Image Library.

Buildings 05

This was put aside for awhile because of lack of focus on anything, but I finally pulled out a fountain pen and did it. I used Platinum Carbon Black, but it makes too thick a line on this paper to suit me. The pen point is Lamy Safari extra fine, so it's the ink on this paper, not the pen point. It is a very inexpensive sketchbook. If I were using a larger size of paper, the thicker lines would be more appropriate for me.

Doodles 04

With the idea of practicing bird shapes, I was bored after the second one. At least it's easier for me to do half-way decent line drawings of birds than it was a year ago.

Two different inks were used in the same model of fountain pens and points. The interior was done using Noodler's Black, and it was fine, though I always let it dry several hours between sessions and before adding the colored pencil. I'm sure it's dry sooner, but my attention span takes me elsewhere. The frame was done using Platinum Carbon Black, and the line is thicker, plus it feathered and blobbed where I hesitated or stopped.

My preferences:
Moleskine Sketchbook: Noodler's Bulletproof Black
Moleskine Watercolor Book: Platinum Carbon Black

Choo-Choo 07

Finally, another locomotive. This is the Lafayette, circa 1840.

Between my very short attention span and mild dyslexia, sketching these trains can be more complicated than they should be, but it's good to have another locomotive completed.

Doodles 03

A sketch of my toesies.

Doodles 02

My attention span is around two minutes now, but I managed to sketch this rooster. Inking the lines took two days. Yup, lousy attention span. Two more days for coloring, but filling in the lines with colored pencil is almost mindless yet enjoyable.

Doodles 01 and 02

I haven't been able to focus lately, so I decided to see if I could make up simple body images and have them look reasonable in proportion and placement. By the second page, I gave up on reasonable.

Buildings 04

A whole building would be a brain strain right now, so here's a window.

Buildings 03

The original scan gave me a magenta barn! This still isn't right, but it's closer to the original sketch.

This building exercise was based on a photograph found in the WetCanvas! Image Library.

Choo-Choo 06

The front half of my John Bull train sketch in my Moleskine Japanese Album.


The back half of the John Bull sketch. I have one more carriage, but my attention span couldn't take it!


Here's the complete train sketch of the John Bull.

I finally took the time to take a good look at the Moleskine Japanese Album. The count of 60 pages includes the front and back of the paper (duh!), so I will only be using 30 pages for my train sets. Thank goodness! It's still a long project, but not as long as I first thought.

My Prismacolor pencils were full-length or close to full-length before the start of this project because they had been used very little. The pencils are now getting a good workout while getting shorter and shorter. Yikes!

Choo-Choo 05

Here's the business end of the John Bull train, and two passenger cars will be added next. Though I should have waited to do the foreground, I got carried away.

Buildings 02

It's difficult not to worry about getting correct proportions and better vertical lines, but at the same time it takes away the pressure of getting things right. I think these building exercises are actually helping, though the results will show in the future, not now.

Choo-Choo 04

The start of my second train.

Buildings 01b

The exercises with building sketches are to help improve my aim with a pencil or pen point, but the previous sketch was just too wimpy. I beefed it up with more ink and some colored pencil. Man, do those light greens go more neon with a scanner!

Choo-Choo 03

One train completed, and many, many more to go. When I get to the larger trains, fewer passenger cars may be shown to save both space and my sanity.

The Moleskine Japanese Album has 60 pages (or one page folded into 60 sub-pages). 57 pages more to go, and I suspect I will not run out of trains to sketch.

Choo-Choo 02

One of the carriages has been added, and two more will follow. The original train carriages were horse-drawn carriages that were refitted with railroad wheels.

This is the DeWitt Clinton locomotive, circa 1830.

Trying to work with an accordion-folded sketchbook in a scanner and getting a flat scan is beyond my capabilities. Skewed, distorted, poorly lighted photos will be taken in the future.

Choo-Choo 01

With a Moleskine Japanese Album in my possession, a decision needed to be made about its content. Since it's actually one very, very long page, I decided it is time to pull out some of my toy trains. This is a start to a long-term project, and I can go back and forth among the pages to add elements and color whenever I wish. It should be fun, but will it ever be completed?