my little northbrook

Observational drawing mash-up of Northbrook College staff (at a recent college training day) and my daughter's My Little Pony dolls. The latter is something of an obsession at the moment, so expect to see more of these in future sketchbook scans...

TWSBI Diamond 580 with Platinum Carbon ink and watercolours in A4 Stillman and Birn Alpha Series sketchbook.

tilted man

I had the idea for this picture a couple of months ago (see below) but the original sketch didn't cut the mustard and remained unfinished. The main problem I had was that the proportions of the leaning figure were too naturalistic. I always need to remind myself to distort and exaggerate parts of the drawing and make the subject 'unreal' in some way in order for it to succeed as an illustration. I'm still not completely happy with the execution of this, but I like the idea.

TWSBI Diamond 580 with Platinum Carbon ink on Stillman and Birn Alpha Series paper (top) and sketchbook (bottom).

meanwhile in the sauna...

College has finished for the summer and without access to one of their A3 scanners, I am forced to scan each page of a sketchbook double spread individually which, as I'm sure you can appreciate, causes me no end of distress and misery.

Explicit content warning: this blog post includes a picture of a man with his winky out.

TWSBI Diamond 580 with Platinum Carbon ink and watercolours in A4 Stillman and Birn Alpha Series sketchbook.

new website

I have a brand new website up and running which I hope to add more content to in the coming weeks. You can see it here.

netsuke

Managed to squeeze in some sketching at the British Museum before heading up to the New Designers exhibition yesterday. Tried an old, unused sketchbook I had lying around but the quality of paper is not great and my pen and ink of choice – TWSBI 580 loaded with Platinum Carbon Ink – feathered and bled on the page so I tried a range of other pens with mixed results...

Faber Castell PITT artist pen (dark sepia) in Seawhite A4 landscape sketchbook.

bronze figure

TWSBI Diamond 580 with Platinum Carbon ink and watercolour in Seawhite A4 landscape sketchbook.

clay figurine

Unipin fineliner in Seawhite A4 landscape sketchbook.

terracotta horseman

Namiki Falcon with Noodlers ink and wash in Seawhite A4 landscape sketchbook.