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Another page filled in the sketchbook from antaresnox. I'm trying to draw something fast every day. The forsythia is in front of the house... And, of course, rhododendron is everywhere.



It's kind of fascinating: rhododendron is an invasive plant, and when I was a kid, people started to plant it in their gardens deliberately "because the bugs don't eat it". This used to be true, except, oh wait, these days they do... I suppose we're seeing some evolution in progress. XD

So, a few weeks ago, I received a wonderful handmade sketchbook from antaresnox, and I just (finally) got around to testing it!



Isn't it lovely? It's tiny (7x7 cm, which is a bit under 3x3'') and has colored pages in pink, yellow, green, and blue. YAY! I love drawing on colored paper!

( More pictures, including the art supplies, behind the cut! )

Here are proper scans of my first two sketches, fuchsia (on a pink page) and aconitum (on a blue page). I used fineliners (Staedtler in 0.1 and Faber castell PITT in M), markers (Faber Castell PITT pen B in sky blue, pink madder lake, and light phthalo green), and a white gel pen (Pentel).





I already adore this little book! :D

I'm sloooooowly starting to send out snail mail again. (I took a break from that when I was ill and potentially contagious.) This inchie (yes, that's a little square of 1x1 inch) is for Atlicedrawsstuff who sent me a care package with art supplies that I also haven't seen yet because I've yet to go home to my family. Anyway, I'm sure it's lovely mail! XD



Paper: Vaessen Florence watercolor paper, smooth, 200 g/m² - I'm actually very happy with this paper although it's rather thin and was super cheap, which means it was a really positive surprise to discover it doesn't buckle much when wet. I originally bought it for sketching while traveling, but I may actually use it for more 'serious' artwork as well. It's much better quality than I would have expected, and labeled as acid-free as well, so, YAY.
Watercolors: Winsor&Newton this time. :) Winsor Violet, Permanent Rose, Cadmium-Free Yellow, and Burnt Sienna. I don't use this box very often but technically these paints are perfectly fine.
Acrylic pen: Uni Posca in white. I'm actually not happy with that one. It dries kind of crackly (I don't know how to describe this, but the dried lines are soooo not elastic they crack when you bend the paper), and it's one of the more expensive acrylic pens on the market, while the super-cheap ones (FlySea) I bought in packs of 12 (!) handle much better.

It's kind of embarrassing but I don't have any scissors here, so Atlice will have to cut the painting once she receives it, ahaha. (I'm not going to buy new scissors because, heck, I've done that before when I forgot to pack any, so, uh, I have enough scissors at home. I mean, I do papercuts, so... I have enough scissors. Really.) I'm also sending Atlice some ATC-sized outlines she can color - I guess I'm going to link those when she got them and painted them. I drew everything on the same postcard-sized piece of paper anyway, which at least makes mailing it really uncomplicated.

Two more postcards for Postcrossing. Simple flowers, my comfort zone - I can produce these reasonably fast.





The daffodil actually does not involve any watercolor - that's transparent acrylics with lots of water. The magnolia is colored with watercolors, in the same style. The preliminary drawings and final highlights were done with acrylic pens.

Another plant-themed ATC. This one, I drew as a Christmas gift for Lumelievm, who happens to like elderflower, which is a very nice coincidence. :)



I used watercolors and a white acrylic pen.

I don't have much time for drawing these days, but at least I have two new entries in my sketchbook, one from last Sunday and one from today! :)



Last Sunday, friends from work decided (relatively spontaneously) to take a trip to Hamburg, and, because I happen to live there, I met with them in the park. (Planten un Blomen, nicest source of interesting botany around here.) They also brought their art supplies! Well, they wanted to do some watercoloring, but that was rudely interrupted by a water show that got everyone (and, worse, everyone's paintings) wet. XD I was not actually productive, but the bench we sat on was surrounded by lovely yellow tulips, so at least I was able to fill a page with those.



Today's page is rhododendron with (not-very-friendly) guests! :) I was taking an afternoon walk with my boyfriend, and, as usual, he had to be very patient while I examined the local shrubbery. It's a year for maybugs: these huge beetles that appear every four years and eat everything green in sight. The one I drew here, on the bottom of the page, was able to finish the whole young rhododendron leaf while I was drawing. I was impressed! (Also, until today, I didn't know these things even eat rhododendron, which is not a native plant they'd be adapted to. They usually prefer beech mass destruction! But, apparently, they really just like anything and everything green...) The rhododendron was also being attacked by others, like the snail I also drew here. Poor rhododendron.

Help with identification? The incredible thing happened: unknown plants two days in a row. If anyone recognizes this thing, please SCREAM!

EDIT: This turned out to be Kerria japonica, thank you so much for the identification, mific!

I was pretty lazy today, art-wise, but while my boyfriend was standing in the kitchen, preparing dinner, I decided to take a little walk and take my sketchbook with me. Maybe I'd find something interesting? And, sure enough, someone in the neighborhood has a very pretty yellow flowering hedge. From afar, I thought, sure thing, that's going to be a Potentilla, how nice!, but when I came closer... Uh, what's that? The leaves are all wrong! (You can see how the leaves stood in the drawing below, I have reproduced one of the shoots of the hedge as accurately as was possible in the short time - about 40 minutes). But, we're still somewhere in the Rosaceae, aren't we?!?

Basically, I'm very confused. Actually, we are in the Rosaceae, so at least I was not totally off, botanically speaking?!?



On the art side of things, I'm quite happy with this page. This time, I didn't just take the same pens I used in my sketches from yesterday, but additionally used a grey marker (Faber Castell), and it's incredible, the difference a few shadows can make! Everything looks much more detailed, even when it isn't really. XD

First outside drawing session this year! The weather was great last week, so I went to the Rhododendronpark (in Bremen) one beautiful afternoon and took my art supplies. :) That is: I didn't actually finish the ATCs there, that would have taken too long. I finished at home! But, the drawing was done at the park.

These are my first ATCs this year. I was being minimalist with the watercolors: I only used purple, green, yellow, and white. (I took advantage of the fact that mixing PV23 dioxazine purple and PG7 phthalo green makes a wonderful, deep black, so I had the whole tonal range covered.)

The flowers, of course, are very typical of springtime: daffodil and pasque flower.

I did some art. :)







For these, I've been using (in combination with other colors) my newest crimes against watercolors:





Making my own watercolors is so much fun!

No sketchbook of mine is complete without begonias! Those are my favorite flowers because... because... because of their leaves, which are mathematically fascinating. (Yes, mathematical interest also features in my appreciation of flora...) This one is distorted (and flipped upside down) by the water droplet hanging from a leaf. Obviously, I wasn't going for realism here (as also evidenced by the huge negative begonia-leaf shape in the background, LOL), I was just having fun. Also, I'm sloooowly trying to catch up.