Dr Sketchy

I wasn't feeling as invigorated this Sunday as usual, possibly because our regular coordinator wasn't able to attend. I mixed up my watercolors with my Pentel brush pen this time, which was fun. And dug out the colored pencils at the end.

I made an attempt to break out of my "comfort zone" at the most recent Dr Sketchy's. I bought my watercolors. I figured they'd lend themselves well to colorful costumes.

I warmed up with my conte crayons as usual, and then made the switch for the longer poses.

The lighting at Dr Sketchy's is, well, often sketchy, but I found from my angle she was very well lit. I kept wanting to bring my colored pencils out knowing I could better capture the beautiful shading. I resisted the urge, reminding myself I wasn't trying to create a masterpiece, and it wouldn't be the last time ever I had a well lit model. So I kept up the watercolors. I enjoyed some of the effects I was getting with them, and plan to have at them again, and try to improve.

I also worked some more, again, at shading in the background to set off the edge of the figure.

I was having one of those days where I wasn't feeling up to snuff with my short pose sketches. There's a local group of figure artists who do a short pose session down the street from me that I'm hoping to get involved with soon, though. It's a great group of people, and though I'm not as into doing the short poses, it's likely to be pretty helpful. I want to try different ways of capturing shape and shadow.

The model was great, and we all had a good time. I had the most fun going with the pink theme of her last costume. That wig looked like it was made of cotton candy.

Another fun afternoon of sketching. I couldn't figure out why she looked so familiar until Mike mentioned something that made me realize I'd met her at a party or two of a mutual friend. Is this where I make a joke about not recognizing someone with more/less clothes on?

She held some difficult poses for more than just the 1 minute sketches.

Often times when I try to shade in a model's eyes they end up looking weird in some way. So I left out her pupils, and they still look weird but in a good way.
Kaz also managed to pose herself in a way that made her really well lit most of the time. It was great, since often the lighting on that stage is just awkward.

I'm a month behind in posting these pictures (which are from March); stay tuned for the Dr Sketchy's I went to yesterday.

I was sad to have missed some of the beginning one minute warmups, as our model had apparently done some amazing poses, while dressed in brightly colored spandex. Yoga training is something that makes for amazing one minute poses. And the goggles and cat ears were adorable. I'm happy with the ones I got to capture.

I ended up having more fun with line this month than shading.

She played some cello, and ukulele for us while posing, which was fun to listen to but less fun to draw, at least for me. Though I captured her legs really well in one drawing.