Art Lesson #19: Live Sketching at the Lake

Sketching--and filming--in the great outdoors

I got outside to sketch on a rare sunny day in February…

…And I decided to take you with me! It is not so easy to sketch and film and talk at the same time. I’ve had my eye on a couple pieces of gear that would make this easier, so if you like this sort of thing, let me know and I’ll improve my setup and do more.

I’ve been experimenting lately with this mixture of markers and colored pencil. The markers are really just there to put down a base layer of color that I’ll draw on top of. So I’m mostly just taking lighter colors—light blues, yellows, greys—and putting those down first before I go to colored pencil.

Why do that instead of watercolor? Well, there’s a bit less to fuss with—I don’t have to get out brushes and a water container and a cloth and my palette—and I don’t have to spend time mixing colors or wait for the paper to dry after I paint, which can take forever in Portland this time of year.

Markers are very fast to work with, and they perform well on this Stillman & Birn zeta …