The Big Picture (with Paul Heaston)

August 22, 2016August 25, 20163 Comments

The final #UskManchester2016 sketching workshop I attended was on the Saturday morning: “The Big Picture“, taught by Paul Heaston. Paul is an absolute master at the curving wide-angle perspective, and that approach to composition and getting everything into the area of your drawing was the focus of this workshop. Paul has a great way at explaining this often difficult concept, and gave out very useful and informative handouts that explained his concept well. This is a look at the five-point perspective – straight ahead, left, right, up above, down below, you’re too slow. Sorry, couldn’t resist. My own sketch is above; while this isn’t something I am unfamiliar with, I do wish I had expanded the scene a bit more, and shown the left-right vanishing points in the frame itself. Still, I had a lot of fun, and while we did stop for some mid-workshop tips, we did have time to flesh out the details. In his handout, Paul gave some great tips on how to draw details in a large sketch like this, noting that the human eye is vastly more capable of perceiving detail than any drawing instrument that we possess, so some economization and simplification is useful. Paul talked a lot about relative scale, and asked us to try to include ourselves in the sketch – within our frame of view of course, meaning our hands and sketchbook. Spatial relationships are also important in determining relative scale. I thought about Father Ted and the cows: “Small…far away…”.

Here is the show-and-tell at the end, with the sketchbooks all over the floor; thankfully this workshop was not rainy! I sketched Paul below, adding some notes from what he told us.

While we sketched, by the way, we were treated to scores of people dressed up as super heroes – Manchester Comic Con was happening nearby at the same time. We saw Deadpools, Pikachus, Winter Soldiers, Flashes, Reys, Scarlet Witches and one absolutely amazing Squirrel-Girl I totally wish I had time to sketch. Oh, and there was one incredibly realistic Captain America, look (hey, Cap was a sketcher too)…

Pete Cap! photo by Marina Regina Tuazon

Key points I took away:

Understand spatial relationships; even if the perspective isn’t quite right you can still describe the space between objects
Don’t be afraid to draw those huge buildings small, if that’s how they are in the overall sketch, as it shows their distance relative to the objects in the foreground
Draw loads of details! Why not? But simplify where you can, and note that the further back things are, the simpler the details
It doesn’t rain every single day in Manchester! It really doesn’t! (Spoiler alert, it rained that evening on the way home)

I very much had fun on this workshop, the last structured part of the Symposium for me (plenty more sketches and posts to come though…). Massive thanks to Paul Heaston – do check out his Flickr and his Facebook pages.

Puzzling out the Picture (with Veronica Lawlor)

August 20, 2016August 19, 20162 Comments

And so we return our attentions to Manchester, and the third of the workshops I attended: “Puzzling out the Picture“, taught by Veronica Lawlor, from New York. This was focused on composing your sketches using directions to move us into and out of the image, to see the picture as “a dimensional space in your mind”, that has six sides. We went down to Catslefield, an area of Manchester I didn’t know much about, but was truly an urban sketchers dream – bridges and canals going in every direction, the perfect space for this sort of exercise. Veronica asked us to move about the space and draw quick thumbnails of the different views we encountered, encouraging us to identify how the eye moves into and around the space. Mine are above; this was a really enjoyable exercise.

Above, Veronica explains the idea. We were then asked to choose a scene from our thumbnails and draw it larger and in more detail. The rain was not heavy, but constant and drizzly – hello Manchester, hi English summer, how I’ve missed thee – and also kind of moving sideways making any cover a bit useless, but we all persisted. I stood beneath a big archway beneath a bridge and drew the scene below. Notice the little iron castle turrets on the railway bridge, a nice touch! Manchester was where the Industrial Revolution was really born, the city is a child of that booming period, and Castlefield really takes you back into that history. It was here that the world’s first industrial canal, the Bridgewater Canal (1764), terminated, and here was also the terminus of the world’s very first passenger railway line, at Liverpool Road station, in 1830. History doesn’t begin with the Industrial Revolution however – nearby was the Roman fort of Mamucium, or Mancunium, which gave Manchester its name (English town and cities with the suffix -chester or -caster generally have origins as Roman forts). I sketched in the usual brown-black pen, but used some grey markers to add a bit of tone, as well as a touch of red.

Now I probably would have done a bit more detail or added a bit more colour, but, well, Chips in Gravy. I remembered that there was a chip shop around the corner from here (I passed it while lost the previous evening, looking for the Peveril) and just had a huge craving for chips in gravy. This is more common in the north of England than in the south, and I absolutely love it. Now it’s not quite the same as poutine – there is no cheese – this is just what you can get at any chippy up north and it drives me mad to even think about it, it’s so good. I used to eat it in Scarborough when I’d go up there years ago. Now, it rained a lot during this workshop, so it was good to take a break from the sketch and go and grab some chips in gravy, and sit in the drizzle, with an orange Tango. Totally a “back in England” moment for me. Then, it was back to the sketching.

Despite the rain (which nobody really minded much), this was an extremely enjoyable workshop. Veronica teaches with a lot of enthusiasm and has a very encouraging manner, and her own work is so alive that it was a real pleasure to learn from her. She joked that it would be nice to come back and sketch Castlefield in the summertime!

Key points I took away:

Think of your pictures as representing a three dimensional space and try see and depict the lines of movement through the scene
Make quick thumbnails from different points of view to physically explore the dimensions of the space before your final sketch
Let shapes extend and move out of your physical boundary
When hungry, eat chips in gravy
Manchester = rain again!

Many thanks to Veronica for a fun workshop! Check out her work at www.veronicalawlor.com, and also her books, particularly “One Drawing A Day“, and “Reportage and Documentary Drawing“, part of the Urban Sketching Handbook series.

shorts, shorts, socks – part 2

August 19, 2016August 19, 20161 Comment

Right, part two of the Premier League kit round up, and without further ado, let’s get going…

PREMIER LEAGUE PART TWO: THE MIDDLING MID-TABLE

LIVERPOOL:

Liverpool 1617

When I was a kid Liverpool were pretty much the best team in the world. Not to me of course, I supported the even greater Spurs, but that Liverpool team of Rush, Dalglish, Hansen, then Beardsley, Barnes, Aldridge, the Grobelaar years basically, they were spellbindingly good. They are less so these days, no league titles since 1990 (yeah, more than Spurs) but with Klopp at the helm, maybe they can claw it back into the top four again. They opened with a 4-3 win at Arsenal which sounds good, but 4-3 games don’t mean championship form. Their kit is pretty slick and basic, gold trim, nothing fancy. The away kit has a few little flashes here and there, but the third kit is an odd lime green of the sort that these days, we look at and say, whatever. If it isn’t a broccoli kit or a ham kit or a human interior anatomy kit I’m not even interested. Prediction? Fifth or sixth I suppose.

STOKE CITY:

Stoke 1617

“But could he do it on a rainy Tuesday night in Stoke?” Is the oft-mentioned cliche when speaking of fancy foreign football fops frolicking about the field. Hardly anyone ever says it about the man who washes cars and waters gardens mid-week in the evenings in Stoke. Stoke were the team of Stanley Matthews (them and Blackpool), one of the greatest ever footballers ever to come out of England. But enough reminiscing about the wizard of dribble; stoke’s kits are made by Macron this year and are smart, quite nice, bit boring perhaps that is ok. How will Stoke do this year? Well if they can do it on rainy Tuesday nights in other places than Stoke they will stay up. Next…

CHELSEA:

Chelsea 1617

Well well well, Chelsea, fancy seeing you down here rubbing shoulders with the common folk, the Stokes and the Watfords. Weren’t you reigning champions a year ago? Mourinho got sacked, your rich guy players farted around, and then you celebrated a 2-2 draw with Spurs like you had won the league again. Well with a top new manager in Conte they might find their form again, but I can’t see them getting back to top spot so quickly. The kits are nice though, I’ll say that. Even the second one. Prediction? Fourth. I dunno.

EVERTON:

Everton 1617

Ronald Koeman is now the manager of the Toffeemen. I loved him when he scored that rocket for Barcelona in the 1992 European Cup final against Sampdoria (I liked both those teams). I hated him when he helped knock England out of the World Cup qualifiers in 1993. I hope he does well at Everton. They will finish mid-table again. I don’t know, 8th. The kits are nice, home kit is simple, Umbro doing a decent job, though the sponsor having a picture of two elephants standing under a fountain, what is that supposed to be exactly? Maybe it’s fireworks? Two elephants playing with fireworks. Or is it spaghetti, and explosion of spaghetti? I don’t know. The second kit is nice, dark. I like the third kit, yellow. Hard to muster up much enthusiasm for these though when you have two elephants standing under a massive exploding spaghetti fountain.

SWANSEA CITY: Swansea 1617

Swansea have done away with flashy Adidas detailing and switched to the classy Joma for 16-17, going for a pure clean white look. The sponsor has a dash of blue which then turns into the away kit, a gradient affair that has an overall calming effect on anyone who sees it, like a peaceful lake or a waterfall. this is scientifically proven to reduce instances of hooliganism in football grounds, so effectively they are bringing a message of peace over from the southern Welsh coast. they will need a third kit. how about an angry fiery red? Fun fact. Swans, did you know they are all owned by the Queen, swans? Where will Swansea finish this year? I don’t know. 11th maybe. 200th. I don’t know. They’ll be fine, they’ll stay up.

WATFORD:

Watford 1617

How are Watford still in the Premier League? Well midtable last time so I suppose they weren’t too bad. I just thought they would go down. Oh right, Villa, Norwich and Newcastle were completely pants. This year the Hornets have ditched Puma for ‘Dryworld’. Dryworld? Who the bloody hell are they? The kits are fairly ho-hum, none of the buzzing horizontal stripes from last year, and why does the away kit have black socks in an all white kit when the home kit has black socks? Answer me that Dryworld, whoever the hell you are. Where will Watford finish? I think this year they go down. Sorry Watford fans. You’re still better than Luton.

WEST BROMWICH ALBION:

West Brom 1617

“West Brom” or “WBA”? Nobody calls them “WBA” any more. Well I don’t think so anyway. For all I know they do it all the time, I don’t know, I don’t live in England. West Brom, the great survivors. How do they stay up every year when it looks like they should just go down? I think it’s Horcruxes. I think that is their secret. I think Saido Berhaino found out and that is why they won’t let him leave. I do like their kit this year, one of the nicest. The light blue trim makes a nice addition and goes well with the Baggies blue. The away shirt is black with pinstripes. It looks nice. West Brom will stay up again. They will not win the league like Leicester did. Unless they use the Imperiatus curse of course.

Ok that was the middle, stay tuned for the bottom six.

d street in davis

August 19, 2016August 19, 20164 Comments

D St Pano Aug 2016 sm

Here is a panorama I sketched of D Street, Davis, last Sunday afternoon. It was a desperately hot day, and uncomfortable standing there for two hours sketching on loose sheets. I drew this over two sheets of Stillman and Birn ‘Alpha’ paper and joined them together to make the panorama – this isn’t in my sketchbook, it is to be framed for the Pence Gallery’s annual Art Auction. That is the Pence there on the right. The Art Auction will run from September 2-17, with a Gala event on the 17th itself. The building on the left was, for a while, “Art Is Davis” (I took part in a joint show there a couple of years ago), and before that was a shop called “Antiques Plus”, but now the building is home to “Land Home Financial”. Things do change. Last time I sketched this scene, the building on the far right of the drawing did not exist, but was put up last year (I did a sketch of the construction but haven’t yet drawn the finished product on the street, except here). On the far left, the Mustard Seed restaurant still going strong, but I’ve not eaten there in a few years (it was quite fancy, I must go back some time with my wife). This is a classic Davis view, and always fun to draw. This is my eleventh summer in Davis. Summers here are long, and dry.

the all-new all-different MU…

August 18, 2016August 18, 2016Leave a comment

Okay, we’re at the halfway mark for Manchester sketches so I thought we’d bring it back to Davis for a bit before resuming the symposium story. This is the current state of the Memorial Union at UC Davis – the shiny new bookstore is now open, but the rest is still under a lot of reconstruction. The UCD Bookstore by the way does stock my book, if you’re interested! the renovated and revamped MU is expected to reopen in December, I can’t wait to see how it finally looks. My son for one is eagerly anticipating the reopening of the bowling alley; he had his birthday there last year and has missed it terribly. Once it’s all done, I will sketch the end result. More change at UC Davis!

The Art and Habit of Travel Sketching (with Rita Sabler)

August 17, 2016August 25, 20163 Comments

There were many interesting and varied talks that you could attend at #uskmanchester2016. Yes, I just used a hashtag in a sentence. Now if were saying that out loud I wouldn’t say the word “hashtag” but then that is why the written medium is capable of things that the spoken medium just isn’t, and vice-versa, and then there is the drawn medium. One thing I like about sketching at talks and presentations is that you can use it not only to document the visual of the event, but also take notes on the text. There is the issue of course that you must be careful what you write down, as that then potentially defines the speaker’s points in possibly unintended ways – take a sentence out of context, written down in a hurry, and sure they did say that, but it may not be what their talk was about. So whenever I have drawn presenters, I have been aware of this and tried to write down the thoughts and phrases that seem most to encapsulate it, though it’s impossible to catch it all.

I only managed to attend one talk in Manchester, having been off sketching the streets all the other times, taking advantage of the non-rain, but I wasn’t going to miss this one, “The Art and Habit of Travel Sketching“, by my friend from Portland, Rita Sabler. I first met Rita at the first symposium in Portland, learning that she was a UC Davis alumna, and have followed her sketching work ever since. She has a really cool and vibrant style, with a lot of travelling under her belt as well. In this talk she showed us some of her amazing travel sketches and shared her experiences around the world, both the good and the sometimes scary. She offered tips and advice on travel sketching, and spoke in general about the act of keeping a sketchbook, and the unexpected interactions it can bring. I wrote down some of what she was saying – click on the image above to get a better view – and some of my favourite takeaways were:

Sketching your surroundings, you become “at once the observer and the participant”
If sketching people in bars, pick the people who have the fullest glass – they will stay there longest!
If people notice you sketching them, smile!

I really enjoyed the talk, and everybody else that was there enjoyed it as well – and it was a full house. I was surprised that more people were not sketching though! I did spot a few others with sketchbooks out. Here was Rita afterwards, holding my book:

You can see more of Rita’s work on her website www.portlandsketcher.com, or on her Flickr page. You can also see three awesome chapters written by Rita in my book, Creative Sketching Workshop!

a peek at the Peveril

August 16, 20161 Comment

“It is these little passages of secret history, which leave a tinge of romance in every bosom, scarce permitting us, even in the most busy or advanced period of life, to listen with total indifference to a tale of true love.”
That was from Sir Walter Scott’s classic novel, Peveril of the Peak, which up until visiting this pub in Manchester, I had of course never heard of. I thought Sir Walter Scotts were something you drank beer out of. It turns out that is kind of right. Peveril of the Peak was the colourful and yet old-fashioned pub was the nightly location of the Drink and Draw, set upon by scores of sketchers inside and out during the few days of Symposium. I sketched it outside (see above) alongside many other sketchers, several seated, others lined up across the street. Take a look at 13 other takes on the pub, collected by Suhita Shirodkar on the Urban Sketchers blog. I’ve seen many more online, each as outstanding as the next. I do love to sketch a pub, as you might have noticed if you have followed my blog at all. I think it’s the classic air of social interaction. I just can’t get that in a restaurant, and hardly ever in cafes either (most cafes I ever go into these days, people are just buried in their laptops). I sketched people as well; at an urban sketching symposium I am much more inclined to do that than at other times, and so I practiced as much as I could. Below, two of my long-time sketchblogging heroes, back from the early days of Flickr, before Urban Sketchers: Andrea Joseph and Jason Das. Now Jason I have known since meeting him in Portland in 2010, and he is an especially cool bloke and an inspirational artist; check out his site jasondas.com. Andrea Joseph I had never until now actually ever met in person – I have her zines and have followed her amazing drawings for years on her blog, so it was wicked to finally meet her in person. Here they are chatting away about music outside the Peveril…

Now I did sketch other people, not all on the same night. Here are a bunch of people who were actually non-sketchers (I know, I was surprised to meet non-sketchers as well, after hanging around five hundred people tooled-up with Micron pens and Leuchturms I had forgotten that other people could even be non-sketchers). I did chat with them and gave the statutory “would you mind if…?” before sketching, and I think they really liked them. For all they knew they were probably drawn about 50 times by others in the pub that evening.

Actually I think the bottom right lady was either a sketcher or with a sketcher; I forget now. California, I believe. The others were locals. On that evening in the Pev, as people would call it, two Portuguese sketchers Vicente Sardinha and Nelson Paciencia, hosted a special Drink and Draw in which they actually made very cool handouts, which gave tips on sketching in a pub (“Sketching while Sober” I think it was called). Then those that took part in the activity all gathered and did a show-and-tell, it was pretty nice. My personal tip for sketching in bars is this – if you draw the bar-staff, draw them busy!

This group of sketchers from around the world was sat in a little ante-room inside the Peveril. They are Tine Klein from Switzerland, Suma CM and (sorry, I forgot to write down your name!) from California, and Mark Leibowitz from New York; unseen is Daniel Nies from Germany, sat to my right, but that is his hat. I sketched them and chatted; I had met Mark in Barcelona in 2013, a lovely guy; I unfortunately missed his presentation on the final day due to getting lost in a sketch (that happens), but I hope to sketch with him again in NYC some day. Suma lives in san Jose so hopefully we’ll sketch together in SF some day; she did come along to the London sketchcrawl as well. After this, I moved into the main bar, and had barely an hour to try and sketch an interior panoramic – as you know, that ain’t long enough, but I dashed through it!

Click on the image to see it in more details.There is Arno Hartmann in the middle there, excellent architect from Germany who was at the Symposium teaching a workshop on 360 degree sketching, really nice to meet him. At the end of the bar, two fellows who were drinking and dancing along to the music on the jukebox – here I must say that I was singing along too, for the music was pretty wicked. I live in America now, I don’t hear the Small Faces, the Jam, the Pistols, Pulp, all those being played at the pub. This was like going back to the great Soho pubs back in the 90s, just all my faves being pumped out all night. I got conversing to the people sat around me; a couple attending the symposium from Austin, Texas (well one sketcher and her non-sketcher hubby, who also loved his music, but was more a fan of Death Metal than David Bowie), plus another couple who were up from Luton. There were local art students there telling us about Simone Ridyard’s books, and the beer was tasty (and a lot cheaper than London). And all around people still sketched away, every single night. On the Saturday evening we ended up there again. I gifted a man we sat next to a quick sketch of his building’s front door (he lived in an apartment opposite the pub), while I unashamedly wore my Captain America hoody with the hood up (just for photos though…), because much of Manchester was dressed up in costumes for that weekend was the city’s Comic Con. I saw an absolutely perfect Squirrel Girl earlier that day and really wish I had sketched her, but I was busy drawing a building. I was one of many Caps. Here I am below with Jason; dear oh dear. Months ago, I had pledged to Simone on the USk Manchester Facebook group page that if I somehow managed to get tickets and time off to attend, I would come dressed as Captain America. Well, I kept my word…

And on that silly note we conclude our trip to the Peveril of the Peak. Stay tuned for more Manchester sketches and stories…

Capturing the Crowd (with James Richards)

August 16, 2016August 16, 20164 Comments

The second workshop I attended at the 7th Urban Sketching Sympo – er,”USKManchester2016″, let’s just call it (that’s the official hashtag by the way, #uskmanchester2016, if you happen to be on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, MySpace, well maybe not MySpace, anyway all those so-called media sites (that is the term right?), just use that hashtag and you will find everyone else’s Symposium stuff. It’s pretty damn wicked.) Sorry, just interrupted a sentence to shorten it with a longer sentence. Ok. The second workshop I took in Manchester was called “Capturing the Crowd“, taught by James Richards, assisted by his wife Patti, and held up at Albert Square (no, not that Albert Square, a real and much better one).

Jim is an excellent teacher who went through everything step by step, how to construct a scene with a crowd of people in it, tips on detail and colour, tricks for poses and perspective. I’d not met him in person before so it was a real treat to learn from this master, especially as I have been trying more and more to add crowds of people into my location drawings. The only thing we didn’t really have was a crowd – that afternoon was pretty rainy (hello Manchester!) – but that wasn’t a problem. People were always walking past, and if you draw enough of them, then voila – you have a crowd!

There is Jim on the right there, I managed a very quick sketch while he was going over the mechanics, as it were. He was extremely well prepared. Now I won’t go over every aspect of what he taught us, but if you pop over to Jim’s website, he has put together a thorough step-by-step demo.

Here are the first quick sketches I did in the workshop, just rapid sketches of people as they passed by, working on poses and using people to create perspective. The final drawing I did is at the top – I stuck around the finish it after the workshop had ended. The rain didn’t last all afternoon, though I stood beneath an arch. I did bump into former USk London sketcher and animator Nathan Brenville, who was visiting family in the north (he now lives in Madrid). He has a colouring-in book coming out soon which is all about Maggie Thatcher!

Capturing the crowd sketches sm

Key points I took away:

Go with the basic eye-level as the point to draw the heads in your crowd – the bodies will shorten as they get further away
Only the front ‘row’ of people need to have details – beyond that, simple people shapes – and bring some people right up close in your sketch, to add to the depth
Legs overlap a lot so many figures walking towards or away from you will appear to have one long ‘upside-down-triangular’ leg
Add a few different colours to peoples’ clothes – even if all the ‘real’ people seem to be wearing shades of grey, a few bolder colours will make all the difference
Yeah Manchester really does like to rain
I should look at a map and not just use the force*

Cheers Jim! Check out more of his lovely work at www.jamesrichardssketchbook.com/

*Ahem. After this I was supposed to meet up with other sketchers at the Peveril of the Peak pub, but I totally got lost TWICE. Even after being given directions. I made it eventually…

Cars in the City (with Lapin and Gerard Michel)

August 15, 2016August 15, 20166 Comments

The 7th International Urban Sketching Symposium kicked off on the Wednesday evening with a big gathering at Manchester Town Hall in a huge, wonderful room that was not unlike the Great Hall at Hogwarts, but more ornate and elaborate. I didn’t however take any photos or do any sketching, busy as I was meeting with old friends and chatting away. I did got for dinner afterwards and sketched there but I will post all the ‘dinnertime’ sketches separately I think. I’d like now to dive into the Symposium itself – above is a quick sketch I did of the first morning introduction session, with Simone Ridyard, Elizabeth Alley and Omar Jaramillo there. It was time to go and sketch, and my first workshop was one I was really looking forward to: “Cars in the City“, with Lapin and Gerard Michel.

Yes indeed. I’ve known Lapin and Gerard since the first Symposium (though have followed their work since the start of Urban Sketchers), both have very different approaches but have a big love of drawing cars, especially classic vehicles. This workshop of course was originally to be co-taught with Florian Afflerbach, the great sketcher of cars who sadly passed away earlier this year. I took a workshop Gerard and Florian co-taught in Lisbon, teaching me a lot about perspective. While this workshop was not necessarily about large scenes and mastering vanishing points, the workshop did focus very much on how the eye perceives the world based on our distance from what we are sketching, and Lapin and Gerard did a good job of showing us what they mean.

Our first assignment was to sketch a car from a distance of about a metre or so, maybe a little more. The view of the car would be more typical, and they gave us an example of how to work out the shape using simple boxes. My first car happened to be a Mercedes, and I drew in pencil (thinking again of Florian), keeping a little way back from the car, crouched, as it looked very much like it might rain. Oh and by the way it certainly did rain.

So we found a car-park not too far away which was sheltered beneath an overpass, and sketched in there. Lapin asked us to sit very close to the car we wanted to sketch – the closer you sit, the more warped the perspective would start to look. This is a good rule for perspective – you position matters enormously, and even slight changes to your position can alter the perspective of what you are drawing immensely. I found a blue Ford Focus – hardly a beautiful car but still attractive for the sketch’s purpose. I drew my reflection in it and also changed the number plate to something more fitting the Symposium. Lapin came and said, sit even closer! I was pretty close, but still two feet or so out – he suggested going right up to the car, and seeing what happened. His suggestion to the class was that we don’t think about perspective rules, rather, just see what is in front of you as a series of shapes, and draw the shapes, letting the picture unfold itself. For my next car then I chose a Rover 400 (below), a more classic British brand, and sat right up to the headlight.

Well I think you can see the difference! Immediately everything bends that bit more, yet the sketch really starts to pop out. This is something I would like to try a bit more. We ran out of time before I could add colour, and we had a little gathering to discuss what we had learned, but the parking attendant in charge of the car-park came along and booted us out; I guess the car park is private property, but it was good shelter from the rain. We moved along to a spot around the corner for the final part of the workshop, drawing cars with the city around them. This was very much Gerard’s part of the class and he showed us some examples; including the cars in the foreground of the sketches helped to add depth but also some foreground anchor to help understand the perspective of the scene. there was a nice spot away from the rain next to an office block, showing a clear view of Manchester’s skyline (thanks to a building having been demolished, I believe it was something to do with the BBC). We did go into the building and ask permission to sit beneath it and sketch, and they were fine with it. It was a very interesting view, with the Palace Hotel there, but oh so rainy.

Key points I took away:

Your perspective of an object curves dramatically as you get closer to it
Use box shapes often helps figure out the car’s overall shape
Draw the scene as the shapes you see and the perspective often figures itself out
Manchester really is quite rainy

Many thanks to Lapin and to Gerard! Awesome instructors!

de vere’s from left to right

August 13, 2016August 13, 20161 Comment

Actually, before we get back to Manchester, here is a sketch I did last weekend right here in Davis. Click on it for a closer view. This is De Vere’s Irish Pub on E Street, which eagle eyed observers will have noticed I have sketched before. I did some thinking about the old curvilinear perspective recently, and how I need to really get it into the sketches more. I do anyway, of course, but I haven’t been doing many where I get both the left and right vanishing point into the picture, so that’s what I did here. I needed to practice it again somewhere familiar, so it was back to the very middle of the bar, similar to the first time, back in 2011. I coloured the page first in a red and orange wash, for some reason, meaning I ended up with a peach coloured background. This took about two and a half hours, or three pints of Smithwicks. It was strange not to be sketching at a bar where every single other person was also sketching (like the Peveril of the Peak!). I had just been to see Suicide Squad, which was, well it was better than Batman v Superman, for sure. A terrible plotline with a lot of problems, but overall not an unwatchable movie, and both Will Smith as Deadshot and Margot Robbie as Harley Quinn were good. Jay Leno as the Joker was very different from the other Jokers, not awful but the jury is out for many, though I am well impressed at how different Jay Leno looks from his cuddly talk show persona. I do like the post-movie pub-sketch, with all the sketching ideas bubbling around my head from Manchester sometimes you just need to unwind and get them out. The first few days back my sketching was a bit of a choke but with this and others since I have kicked back into gear, and now I’m heading towards my sketchbook show at UC Davis this Fall, “Conversations with the City”. Details to come soon!