A Drawing a Day (post 2)

I went to the Powerhouse Museum on Saturday with the Sydney Sketch Club and really enjoyed sketching some of the costumes from 'Strictly Ballroom' the film. Watercolour pencil and watercolour has always seemed the perfect way to sketch costumes and I had a lovely time giving it a go. My favourite are the Faber Castell Albrecht Dürer watercolour pencils. They have a huge colour range but what I love is that the colours are realistic, don't change dramatically when you add water, are generally lightfast and are nice and soft so rewet well.

Strictly Ballroom costume sketches in Moleskine watercolour sketchbook.

I then went to the Tea Cosy in the Rocks, Sydney, and met up with a lovely bunch of sketchers for a tea party with my friend and fellow sketcher Liz Steel. So my next artist's style to tackle is Liz. Not easy as she works very quickly and I don't. However I started by drawing a teacup - one of her favourite subjects - complete with tea.  The initial drawing was done in a grey water-soluble pencil. I used a lovely fountain pen with a flexible nib to do the black details, filled with De Atramentis Document Black ink which is waterproof. Then added the watercolour washes.

I tried to draw another subject in a much faster way than I usually would so I did a quick sketch in water soluble pencil, added line-work in fountain pen - my Lamy Joy with an EF nib this time - added a wash of watercolour and left it alone. I was using Sailor Nano ink in the pen, which is not completely waterproof in this pen so it blurred just a little. Probably a good thing as it stopped me from fiddling :-)

A quick study, watercolour pencil, pen and watercolour.

I'll try that Chinese bronze again with water-soluble pencil and watercolour without the ink in a more realistic style another day...