Recently for a few years I stopped carrying a sketchbook even after having done that all my life, at least since I was a schoolboy. But I’m back sketching now – and enjoying it.
People is what I like to draw. I enjoy that more than drawing scenery or buildings.
Usually I draw in a cafe and focus on fellow customers seated at tables. But lately I’ve been sketching at tables in the open inside shopping mall courts.
It’s stressful sketching an old log with with my dog about. Debarking wood is one of his hobbies, which means he could make the log worthless as a sketch subject in moments, any second.
Potential doggy destruction of my subject is one stress point. A constant pitiful whining if he’s bored is another. And having to regularly pick up and throw his stick is only a mild stress point since I can lose my ‘place’, but in return it gives me reasonable intervals of peace. Digging on the other hand… Continue reading Dog-walk Sketching: Stress.
It’s my habit when sketching on the dog walk to always carry a spare pen. Just like you carry a spare wheel in the car when driving or a puncture outfit when cycling. Because if you do only have one pen – it does this.
I’d found a spot and had brought out my sketch book and BIC biro and had begun to draw. Then the pen stopped. Only then did I notice my black sticky fingers and the Ink leaking from the pen everywhere except where it’s supposed to. I was left in a frustrated mess with an aborted birth of a sketch and nothing to fix it with.
