Oops the outdoor boy is sitting in my indoor boys favourite spot on hubby’s chair. He is getting his paws under the table. Indoor boy is sitting by the halogen heater trying to ignore the situation, but I know his nose is out of joint… (it’s been three days since he sat on me, he’s more distant, especially when outdoor boy wants to have some love.) Now I need to make sure they are all happy. The outdoor cat will probably stay a while, get warm, then go back outside. They are all well fed and indoor girl is on her bed upstairs…. Cats, it’s like watching a soap opera… ‘get orf my chair kitty’ ‘why are you lettingbhim sit there, hooman?’
This is where we walked today, up the hill, across the valley of the Trent. Part of the city laid out across the view. We are a long but thin city. Countryside all around us. A lot of green spaces despite the terraces. Not huge and grey like Manchester and Birmingham. Yes we get traffic jams and pollution, our infrastructure is poor, with many bottlenecks for cars and lorries, particularly when the nearby motorway gets blocked and all its traffic hits the cities dual carriage ways. Then again we can be completely blocked up by snowfalls. Ah well, that’s life…. The tree looks out over all of that and just ignores it and carries on growing…
Today’s challenge was to draw cans for today’s #bandofsketchers challenge. Turns out a lot of things in my store cupboard was mainly coloured red. This was mostly coloured in with a watercolour pen that certainly zings. I’m not sure these are the actual colours, I was trying to take a photo in between bright sunshine and deep shade. The resulting photo was too dark so I had to adjust the exposure a bit to brighten it without making the red overwhelming, too be honest I still think it’s a bit bright.
This was a tiny painting I did three years ago soon after I got my studio at Spode. I paint small pictures so that if people don’t have wall space for anything large they could still have something, and not expensive. This was about 1″ by 2″, it was sold at a craft fair (remember the heady days when people could go out and cram into a place full of lovely crafts and art?). Maybe, one day, I can do a few more.
If you are learning to draw have you tried drawing vanishing points yet? If you draw a horizontal line along the middle of a piece of A4 paper you can work out how to do three dimensional objects. Draw a dot somewhere along that line. Use a ruler and draw lines radiating from it. Then draw vertical lines up or down to them. Instant buildings in perspective. You can even use more than one vanishing point. For curved objects like a can or a glass it gives you a clue on how to draw curves and what direction they will be in. Generally upwards if you are looking from below the rim of a can and downwards if from above. It all depends on your eye level. The horizontal line in this exercise represents that. But it’s your choice. The line can be higher or lower (think of the view for a child, closer to the ground, or someone at the top of a bus!)
I used to also have fun drawing boxes with this, or alien buildings, or anything, I tried it with a horse once! You can use soft pencil to draw in the lines so you can erase them later, or use to mark out an object before you start a painting. It helps you sort out all types of things, including portraits or figures. Just play about with it. I only suggested A4 as that gives you plenty of room…. You can use any size or type of paper.
Looking through my photos of small paintings with gold leaf, I found this of my girl cat. I think I was about half way through this painting. I used the gold leaf to emphasise her eyes and the cushion behind her. I know I have a bit left over. I was not very good at attaching the gold leaf, its hard to stop it wrinkling and breaking up, but I would say its fun to use and have a go if you fancy it.
Don’t know what these berries are on but they are beautiful, they were along a track downhill from the canal. There were also pieces of old wood that had bracket fungus growing on them. Autumn is a lovely time of year when strong colours can ping out. Looking at the tangle of branches on the left hand side I might play with it and duplicate the pattern.
This cygnet came over to see us while we were by the canal today. Sadly I had nothing to feed it. If I had thought I would have taken some brown bread. You are really supposed to feed them grain, but signs went up a few years ago saying don’t feed birds bread and some birds starved in the winter. I think the important thing is to give birds small bits of bread, if it’s big lums it can swell up in their crops and clog them up, also I guess it might be better if it’s a bit wet? Not sure, but as long as its not mouldy….Next time we visit I will take some bread x