Racquet

Just been chillin'

I haven't sketched for a couple of weeks or so.  I've been on annual leave from work (I was at the Wimbledon championships, which were amazing) but I managed to do this little sketch in half an hour during my lunch break today.  I was keen to post something on the blog and keep my hand in.   The head/face/hair are pretty iffy (particularly as I was drawing from an image of Stan Wawrinka with a towel around his neck) I did rather rush it in the last five minutes before I had to start work again.  Having seen Stan in real life on Centre Court at Wimbledon, I am now his biggest fan.  I expect he'll feature on the blog again in the future.

Audrey

The Wei to draw hair

I used a soft 4B pencil here

At some point I was going to have to try to learn how to draw hair properly.  I have found The Art of Wei's excellent drawing videos on YouTube.  If you check out his website you will find he has an impressive catalogue of professional work. His videos are aimed at beginners or improvers and are a pleasure to watch as he clearly loves what he does and is happy to share his experience with others.  I previously had a go at drawing cloth by following one of his other videos.  Here is my first attempt at drawing hair  after applying his tips. I drew this from a picture in Vogue magazine.  The face was an afterthought really, which is one reason why it is a bit wonky. Lots of room for improvement of course but a satisfactory first effort.

I used a soft pencil with a rounded point as Wei suggests, which does make it much easier to try and create a more realistic effect.  I drew the face with the soft pencil too as that is what Wei did in the video but trying to draw detail without a fine point at the end of your pencil is pretty tricky.

Joshwa

F and 6H pencils

Hillary

2H and HB pencils

Billy Bob

Sketched in about half an hour during my lunch hour with a 2H and an HB pencil.  I would have worked on it some more if I'd had the time.  I often wonder how long it takes an artist to draw one of those hyper-real pencil portraits; probably days I imagine.  I could work on this a little more tomorrow I guess. I'll wait and see what mood I'm in then.

Edinburgh College of Art Degree show 2015

My favourite piece was this wonderful
painting by Michelle Alcock

Amy D'Agorne Craghill's photographic study
of a Rudolf Steiner education. These
welly boots reminded me of my cousins who
also studied at a Steiner school

My sketching journey began around about the same time I attended the very inspiring Edinburgh College of Art Degree show of 2014.  I couldn't miss this year's event therefore so I went along on a lovely sunny evening to their late showing.  There was some great stuff on display and here are some which caught my eye

There is also an architecture course at the College.
Based upon what I saw here, we have some talented
architects who can contribute to the urban landscape
in the future.

By Karen Fleming

Sky Su's video installation was a lot of fun (the audience
is the art)

Sculpture by Thomas Dawson

Kate

July 2014

June 2015

I've tended to draw more male portraits than female, so I thought it was about time I sketched a female.  I've picked someone older as the older face has more interest from a sketching point of view (a beginner sketcher at least). I picked Kate Adie here.  The likeness isn't great but it's fairly decent from the point of view of realism I think (for my level of skill).  Most of my recent sketches have been either with a 2H or 6 H pencil. These are hard graphite which draw very feint lines. This time I began with a darker F pencil then filled in some parts with a 2H.  I'm rather pleased with the outcome.  It is certainly a massive improvement from my first portrait, of Tom Hardy, which I drew almost one year ago.

Kennedy

Just Junkies

"I've never been in a movie"  "I don't sing songs"

Sculpture starts here

Tony Blair marks progress!

I began sketching one year ago with no prior experience or teaching (other than at High School, a long time ago) and never having even tried before.  I enjoyed my early attempts and decided to launch the blog so that I could keep a record for myself of my progress.  I had some hope to improve as time went on.  My subjects and media have been varied, as reflect my own interests.  In particular I found that what I most hoped to achieve was to draw a portrait which was recognisable as the person  it was supposed to be.  It's a skill I admire in other artists.  In recent days I've failed miserably (Patrick Stewart, Matt Damon, Michael Fassbender, Humphrey Bogart, Pablo Picasso) but today I managed to draw my 'best' portrait yet.  Several people have recognised this to be Tony Blair.  Hooray, job done!  Well clearly I still have a long way to go but I'm certainly pleased with my progress particularly as I always believed I had two left hands.  I hope some of you will be inspired to try your hand at art too.

Man under his hat

Man with bow tie

Drawn with 6H pencil. 

Untitled

Assassin

Make it so

The Thinker

Pompeii people

I used the 0.2 Uni Pin again to draw these tourists in Pompeii.  I wasn't drawing a scene, instead I was just focusing on some random individuals to practise drawing people.  I like the sort of cartoon feel that this type of pen gives.  These folks have turned out a little anatomically challenged. I think they are a little bit cute too though so I'm not too troubled by that.