When I was in art school, I would go into downtown Vancouver and draw the urban things that my suburban satellite city didn't have. There were things like tall buildings, alleys, tugboats and people in a much busier environment. I guess I was urban sketching before I even knew that 'this was a thing'.
I was drawing less as time went on but when I was living in Scotland, the relatively different look of things made me pick it up again. I also switched to using a ballpoint pen at that time. The pencil in my older sketchbooks were blurring from the gentle smudging of the pages.
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| Sketching the breakwater at Port Taranaki, New Plymouth, New Zealand. (Jan 2013) |
What materials do you use? Describe your technique:
Pretty much all my drawings here are done with a ballpoint pen on location. I don't use pencil first since I find that a ballpoint can make a light enough line without committing too much ink right away. I do however rip out a LOT of pages from my sketchbook. My technique is pretty unforgivable if something is majorly wrong. Often, I will return for more than one sitting or draw 'just enough' to finish it at home (like shading).
If I colour a sketch, I use Photoshop and a graphics tablet. I paint 'behind it' with the black lines on top since to me the sketch is still king and I like the comic book style result. Usually, my drawings are detailed enough with enough information that I can remember what colour everything is. Sometimes I might come back for a second look or take a photo to help me remember the types of colours things are. In many cases, I will just guess most of the colours!
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| Original sketch with ballpoint pen, done on location. |
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| Same sketch with digitally painted background, added in later. |
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