And More Graphite
Tag: sketchbook
Charcoal!
Black and white art is cool. It’s dramatic. It’s dynamic. It’s expressive. It’s also messy. But I love it.
It took numerous sketches to find a look I liked. With the Blue Jay drawings, I finally found it. I started with a very blurry vine charcoal image, blended it out with a brush, refined it with erasing, and added details with a carbon pencil. The softness comes from blending and using a touch of powdered charcoal with a brush. I use a white charcoal (chalk or pastel) pencil, too, but haven’t yet found one I like.
Oil Pastel Practice
Sometimes I need to remind myself that a sketchbook is for practice. I sketched two monochromatic pictures to keep color choices minimal.
I practiced sketching oranges. With some, I used the chroma color first, with others a layer of white. The one I liked the best used three different but related colors that overlapped. The color was more convincing, and the texture was the best of the three (bottom right).
And apples are my favorite thing to sketch when I’m practicing.
Oil Pastel Sketches
All quick, from my own reference photos, and sketched without any type of grid to help with proportions.
