Roz Wound Up

Dogs, Weirdo Journals, and Speed Series: Part 3

Left: Third sketch in my speed series of French Bull Dogs. Pentel Pocket Brush Pen and gouache on old Folio paper (no longer available) in my small and narrow (3.5 x 8 inch) weirdo journal. Click on the image to view an enlargement.

This was the final sketch in my speed series of French Bull Dogs on the evening of November 22. The previous two sketches are the subject of my previous two blog posts (Saturday, December 5 and Sunday, December 6). Today's image is the final spread in this journal, so it was the end of the series. If I had not been at the end of the book I would have liked two more sketches, but I was content to stop and do my "finished journal" dance. (That sort of disrupts the momentum of a speed sketching series!)

This image calls up one more point I want to share with you about working in a drawing series (whether you are working quickly or slowly and methodically)—vary your angles.

Move around your subject so that you see it from a variety of angles—including angles that you might otherwise not attack.

Work from those angles now, in a series because you are absorbing all the information you can about your subject and you want to view it from any angle. When you work in this mode in a speed series you will often find your mind, hand, and eye, quickly supply a visual understanding of something you've been struggling with. And if they don't, well they are one step closer to having an epiphany because you have put them on notice that they need to be aware of these things!

Dogs, Weirdo Journals, and Speed Series: Part 2

Left: Second quick brush pen sketch of a French Bull Dog in my small and narrow weirdo journal—the series was started to finish up the book. Click on the image to view an enlargement. (Note: you'll see some gray dots on the page spread which are actually areas of paint that have seeped through the paper. It happens rarely with the old Folio paper I love so much, but it is good to see it happen once in a while to remind me that even the "perfect" papers I can no longer get weren't perfect.)

In this second part of my Speed Series instructions I want to point out one of the main reasons I want to encourage you to work in your journal when doing a speed series. Your journal (if you've been reading my blog and experimenting with some of the techniques I present and discuss) will have some pages with pre-painted backgrounds or collage material already stuck down. Those are great pages to work on in a speed series because you have to adjust what is already there, just as I had to adjust to the blue painted background that shows up in the first image of this series, posted yesterday!

Then there are sure to be blank page spreads as well, like the one shown here. In the course of the speed series if you switch from one type of background to the next you will be increasing your brain's ability to think on it's "feet."

In the second brush pen sketch in this series when I turned the page and found the blank background I decided immediately to not use any paint, to simply sketch with the brush pen. It makes you think about your line quality in a slightly different way when you know you aren't coming back to shade or color with paint.

Focus instead on things like negative space (around the ears and chest, or chin, or in the ears for that matter). Here, one spread from the end of the book I'm finally getting my "sizing" right and while the nose falls in the gutter and that's not the most fortunate of outcomes, I love the proportion of animal on each page and what is leading off the spread in all directions.

So now go do another speed series in which some of the backgrounds are painted, some aren't; in which some are pen and watercolor or gouache, and some are just ink. Make your brain jump through hoops.

And if the series you did yesterday after reading my post already had those elements, great. Do another series focusing on a different subject. That's how it works.

Dogs, Weirdo Journals, and Speed Series: Part 1

Left: A sketch of a French Bull Dog in my small, narrow (3.5 x 8 inch) Weirdo Journal, using a Pentel Pocket Brush Pen and gouache over acrylic ink (cobalt blue) that was already painted on the page. Click on the image to view an enlargement.

I have a stack of art books I want to review on my blog but I have had little time to make my way through them, much less organize my thoughts. Some sort of list or series of posts about those books will come to you in the next several weeks, sadly, not in time for you to purchase them as gifts if you celebrate any of the upcoming holidays, but perhaps some new reading for the new year?

In the meantime I wanted to show you a few more spreads from the SMALL and NARROW weirdo journal I finished on November 22. (I'm now well into the new 8 x 8 inches or so journal and will have much to say about it soon.)

I think it is important to think in terms of series. I've said this before on the blog, but I can't say it enough. Series teach us something about our subject, our materials, and ourselves (our tastes, our determination, our frustration level, our current skill level, our goals…).

They can also be useful in rounding out a book in lickety-split speed so that you can go on to a format that is more welcoming.

On the other hand, working in a fast series within a journal will also help you acclimatize to that journal if you are having trouble with the journal—feeling it is too precious, feeling your work isn't going well, whatever!

APICA Notebooks: Possibilities…

Above: Poorly lit photo (sorry, no time to get out the grey paper and put up lights) of some new paper and notebook options I found at Wet Paint the other day. On the left is the APICA 5-signature soft-bound notebook, on the right is the red "Scroll" (it has a scroll pattern on the front cover) one-signature soft-bound notebook, in the center under these is a test painting on the paper of the red "Scroll" notebook, and in the front, some highly acidic, but really fun (and thin) airmail paper. Click on the image to view an enlargement.

Some papers appeal to me because they speak to the student in me, still lingering on, who remembers what it was like to work in exercise books, write reams of notes, and scribble on any slip of paper regardless of the line or grid pattern that covered that paper.

So if you've still got a connection to that inner student in you the APICA notebooks might just be something to look into. They just arrived at Wet Paint (I had begged them to call me as soon as they came in so I could run over and buy some to test out.)

Oversized Thumbnails and Studies: How I Start Thinking about Making a Dog Portrait

Above: My favorite German Shepherd Dog: Dozer. Pentel Pocket Brush Pen and Schmincke Pan Watercolors on Quattro gridded paper (8.5 x 12 inches). Click on the image to view an enlargement.

Visitors to my blog know I visited Dozer's home on Sunday to check out the new addition: Tucker, an 8-week old puppy! Well even though there is a lot of cuteness floating around in the air at Roseanne's household that doesn't mean I'm immune to the handsome features of Dozer.

When I returned home and finished my work I took a look at the photos I'd taken at Roseanne's. I had several nice photos of Dozer's features so I threw the images up on the computer screen and sat back with my 8.5 x 12 inch Quattro gridded pad and a Pentel Pocket Brush Pen and did a bunch of quick sketches. I consider them giant thumbnail sketches. They make me think about composition and organization of those features.

I threw watercolor washes on this sketch. The problem with painting a portrait of Dozer is that lovely sable coat of his. (It's no accident that I love black and white Malamutes.) This color study is all about finding a visual vocabulary to map, model, and represent that coat. It will be followed by many more color studies before I ever get to a final painting. I'm leaning towards using acrylics.

And I'll have to go back and visit Dozer to do some sketches from life—oh and isn't it convenient that I'll get to see the little guy! (A cunning plan if ever there was one.)

Birds in the Small Weirdo Journal

Left: Here's another spread from the small weirdo journal, which is even more weird because of it's odd size: 3.5 x 8 inches approx. Graphite sketch of a pet store bird; it is so fun to use pencil on this old Folio paper. I don't like working with pencil on the currently available version of this paper, but while I was in this journal made with the old paper I couldn't resist. (.9 mm mechanical pencil with B lead.) Click on an image to view an enlargement.

Playing around with pencil and not caring if it smudges across the spread in this journal. Birds are getting a little scarce around here. I'm going to return to a "secret" location Tom and I discovered the other day, to see if the hundreds and hundreds of Canada Geese are still there. In the meantime I'm grateful for pet store birds.

Twin Cities Life Drawing Co-ops

Left: sketch made at life drawing with a blue Prismacolor Colored Pencil on the smooth white paper of the Great Canadian Sketchbook (available at Wet Paint).

I've been absent from life drawing for too long (spring of this year!). I need to get back. Thinking about that absence made me decide to compile a list of life drawing co-ops in the Twin Cities (typically—when I'm actively participating—I attend a small private group so I can't recommend it when people ask about co-ops). I started asking people what groups they attended. Laura Schmieg gave me a long list of life drawing co-ops which I have turned into a "page." (Check the list of Pages in the left column of this blog.) It should be easier for people to locate it there as time passes.

If you would like to read about why I go to life drawing, and view the list go to Twin Cities Life Drawing Co-ops in the page list now.

If you attend a public drawing group that is not on the list, or have updated or more complete information on one of the groups listed, I'd love to hear from you.

Puppy Breath: There is Nothing Like It

Above: Tucker, an 8-week-old male German Shepherd Dog, all set for adventure. Photo ©2009 Roseanne Carbone. Click on the image to view an enlargement.

"Be sure to breathe some puppy breath for me," called out Nan as she got into her car Saturday. We had finished tracking (I laid tracks for her 2-year-old Australian Shepherd Zeke, who tracks with joy, enthusiasm, and accuracy!) and chatted for a couple hours about matters dog and human. She knew I hoped on Sunday to visit our friend Roseanne who had just picked up her new German Shepherd Dog puppy, Tucker.

What is it about puppy breath that is so wonderful? The warmth, the sweetness, the rhythm of it. 

Irodori Antique Watercolor from Holbein

Left: Swatches made in 2006 in an Aquabee spiral sketchbook. (That's a pink Post-it Note at the bottom right that I forgot to remove before scanning.) Click on the image to view an enlargement.

I was talking about using limited color palettes in watercolor a week or so ago (actually I'm always talking and writing about this) and someone asked for recommendations if only three tubes of gouache paint were to be purchased. I can't find that note and the person's name, or where I addressed it in the comments, but what I can say is that when I shut down the computer that night I got out an old sketchbook to check on something and I found this yummy chart of a test of three Irodori Antique Watercolor paints from Holbein.

Whoa—I'm not suggesting you run out and buy these paints. I'm posting this chart as an example of one of the many experiments you need to do when you are testing out new paints and trying to ascertain where they will fit in your palette (if at all). 

Before you buy this or any brand please make sure that the pigments used in the paint meet whatever standards you have for lightfast properties and other component characteristics.

If you paint transparent watercolors you'll find that the three colors selected here will all be too heavy for most of your applications. Also these paints don't rewet well at all (there are warnings about only putting out what you need for a session in every sales brochure on them) so they aren't a useful candidate for making your own pans of color. But if you like to play with different textures in your watercolors or work in the studio or field from tubed paint you might want to look at the Irodori Antique Watercolor line from Holbein. (The colors in the line are colors used in "ancient" Japanese and Chinese art, hence the use of the word "antique" in their name.)

Regardless of what brand of paints you're using you need to take some time to explore the blending possibilities and see what you really can do with simply 3 paints—in this case a red, blue, and yellow. I would be quite happy working with this lot in the studio as I can get my Malamute Gray.

Another Weirdo Journal

Left: Page spread from the next weirdo journal (3.5 x 8 inches approx.). A sketch of a pear using Stabilo Tones. I have scanned this narrow book with the covers visible so you can see the decorative paper on those covers: decorative paper I made with metallic acrylic paints. Click on the image to view an enlargement.

After I finished my last weirdo journal things didn't "normalize." I elected to work in a very oddly shaped journal, 3.5 x 8 inches, that I had made in 2001 as a class sample. (The goal of the class was to make two books: a larger 8-inch square book and then this smaller book with scraps.)

The paper used in this book was the original Folio paper I love so much. Of course I didn't want this book to sit idly on the shelf, even if it did have an odd aspect. Also, lugging the weirdo journal around became quite a trial at the end as it got heavier and heavier with more collage material—and it was never a light volume to begin with. A small, light book seemed just the solution.

And it was, in a way the solution—less neck stress because of a lighter pack. In another way it was a challenge as the page spread was so narrow that placing a point of interest so it didn't fall in the gutter or so the rest of the subject didn't disappear off the side of the page became an interesting game, not always successfully played. Such was my reaction to the book that I whipped through the 54 pages (left after I'd cut pages out to leave room for collage material) in 10 days and sighed audibly when I closed the book finally.

I'm glad I worked in this book because the paper is too yummy to pass by, but I'm also glad I was able to work through it quickly and return to my preferred size 8 x 8 inches or so. I'll post more pages from the journal as time goes by. Meanwhile I'm left to ponder how to refer to such "oddities" I recently dubbed weirdo journals, in a transitional time (and when isn't one in a transitional time?). Especially when weirdo is definitely the norm and not weird at all.