eller

Another postcard for someone on postcrossing - this time, it's a combination of drawing, painting, and papercut. It has transparent windows! The book page, inkwell, ink blob and large leaves are see-through.



Materials:
Watercolor paper: Florence watercolor paper, smooth, white, 200gsm. This was a bit of a compromise: it's the thinnest possible paper for watercoloring, but the thickest possible paper for reasonable papercutting. (Still: not much detail possible.)
Transparent paper: Folia, 115 gsm (I chose the thicker variety, for obvious reasons), light green.
Fineliners: Staedtler, different sizes.
Acrylic pens: FlySea, white and black.
Watercolors: various brands, no idea which was what. It was not my watercolor box. I'm not at home and didn't grab the box in my bag when there was a perfectly good one open on the table.
Knife: snap-off utility knife. Cheap but good. XD Seriously, it performed really well (as in: non-wobbly, good angle, and ergonomic in my hand) but it's a no-name thingy, no manufacturer printed on or anything.
Varnish: LUKAS spray varnish, satin gloss. (Added to protect the watercolors before gluing everything together.)
Spray glue: Ghiant Hightac, an ancient can. Oh well, it came out a bit yellowed and blotchy but it still worked... Somehow.

More pictures (of the papercutting and of what the card looks like with backlighting) behind the cut.

( Pictures! )

I'll definitely make more cards with this technique. It's so much fun! :D

Two animal postcards for people on Postcrossing.





Both cards are made with acrylic pens (various brands) on watercolor paper (JAXON Aquarell Postkarten, and by the way, those suck, I am only using the box up so they are finally gone). I like that the acrylic pens behave almost like watercolors when you spread the color with a wet paintbrush but are waterproof after drying. I used spray varnish on the cards anyway, to protect them in the mail.

We all like cute animal pictures, right? Right. XD Anyway, yesterday, I had a bit of a surprise:



Yes, that's a hare. (If you've never seen a hare: imagine a giant rabbit with slightly off body proportions, lighter eyes, and black-tipped ears. But mainly, you can tell them apart because a hare like this is really f*cking large, think medium-sized dog. LOL) In the middle of the day - and it's not the mating season for them. Oh, and in a park populated by humans, too. The thing is, usually, you don't see hares up close. (Unless you're a hunter and/or very patient.)

They are there, and they're not officially counted as a threatened species anymore, either, but you just don't see them, because a) they're nocturnal (unless it's mating season), b) they're extremely shy (and smarter than rabbits, and they remove themselves immediately if anything approaches), and c) they're really f*cking fast (Wikipedia says, "Hares can reach maximum speeds of 35 mph (56 km/h)^[68] in short distances of approximately 90 meters, and a top speed of 50 mph (80 km/h) for about 20 meters.^[69]"), which means that once they've noticed you, typically, all you see is that famous zigzag blur. (They change the direction while running in order to confuse predators.)

Admittedly, the Rhododendronpark (in Bremen) is kind of quiet during lunchtime, but really, a hare deciding this is a good place to feed during the day is kind of unusual, and a human getting close enough to get a picture with a "normal" compact camera (no tele objective) is just unlikely... I was actually kind of worried in case the animal was ill. But nope...



Sure enough, as soon as I began taking pictures, the animal heard me (when focusing, the camera makes a beeping noise that I can't seem to turn off - maybe I'll have to destroy the beepy speaker thingy physically, because animals really dislike this sh*t) and decided to leave in a hurry - which, of course, is exactly the behavior you would expect when its sasse (sorry, I don't know the English word - you know, the earth hollow that hares fixate on) isn't anywhere close, so it can't simply crouch down and play dead.



Ultra-slow (by hare standards; I still only got two pictures) zigzag run! XD

I wasn't paying attention to the plants at the time, but in the first picture, you see the likely explanation why I got so close in the first place: poppies. (These seed capsules are unmistakeable.) What a lovely place for a hare to get high... *headdesk* (Scientific note: no, that's not the poppy you use to make drugs; it would be kind of illegal to plant that in a public park. But even something with not enough opiate content to work on humans would likely be sufficient for a smaller mammal.) So, um, that hare was perfectly healthy and well fed (slightly overweight, even) but with a seriously slowed-down perception and reaction time due to, um, botanicals. Great. I mean, I would love to pretend I'm just that fast, but...

...we all know it's not possible to out-race a hare by fair means, right? You have to out-wit them. Maybe you know the famous story of The Hare and The Hedgehog, but apparently, drugging the poor beast will also work. ;)

How aggressive can botanical illustration get? YES! (It's all in the composition: triangles for the win.) Plus, of course, the most important design element are the thorns. :)



Materials I used:
Stillman&Birn Zeta Series sketchbook (270 g/m²)
Watercolors: Michael Harding Yellow Lake (PY180), Winsor&Newton Transparent Orange (DPP), Blockx Blockx Red (PR254), ROSA Gallery Magenta Rose PR(122), MaimeriBlu Faience Blue (PB60), Mijello Bamboo Green (PG36), White Nights Burnt Umber (PBr7), Rembrandt Spinel Grey (PBk26)
White gel pen (Pentel)

...aka the rodent repellent, needed in every garden. XD (It stinks of fox, which sucks, but sucks even more for rabbits and mice.)



Materials I used:
Stillman&Birn Zeta Series sketchbook (270 g/m²)
Watercolors: Michael Harding Yellow Lake (PY180), Winsor&Newton Transparent Orange (DPP), ROSA Gallery Magenta Rose (PR122), Schmincke Horadam YInMn-Blue, Mijello Bamboo Green (PG36)
White gel pen (Pentel)

The long weekend over Easter was artistically active. :) This one is completely with pigments that belong to my 'standard' set - nothing out of the ordinary. Weird tulips found, of course, in the Rhododendronpark Bremen.



Materials I used:
Stillman&Birn Zeta Series sketchbook (270 g/m²)
Watercolors: Mijello Bamboo Green (PG36), Blockx Blockx Red (PR254), MaimeriBlu Faience Blue (PB60)
White gel pen (Pentel)

North Germany's weirdest invasive species. Bremen has the world's largest rhododendron collection, which is a quite fascinating scientific project (it's not just a very pretty garden - though it is - but also a gene bank and everything, so, the 3000 species of rhododendron are not purely there for decorative reasons) but does horrible things to the local ecosystem. When I was a kid, people were like, "oh, we'll plant rhododendron because the bugs won't eat it". This used to be correct, except these days, we don't just get all the invasive bugs that come with what's essentially a monoculture of invasive bushes, but also, some local bug species have evolved to eat rhododendron. I've seen a maybug eat a rhododendron leaf, and you have no idea how weird that is! (Evolution in progress, I suppose.) Anyway, whatever I may think about the ecological impact of this weird gardening project, the view in spring is spectacular. They also have other plants (including some really fascinating ones) and I enjoy going there with my sketchbook and colors! So, uh, have some rhododendron...



...I have to admit I have no idea which of the 3000 species it is. Theoretically, all their plants are properly labeled, so, the bush should have had a tag somewhere with its name, except of course it was not visible because all those leaves get in the way. Some Rhododendron it is. ;)

Materials I used:
Stillman&Birn Zeta Series sketchbook (270 g/m²)
Watercolors: Turner Permanent Lemon (PY109), ROSA Gallery Magenta Rose (PR122), Mijello Bamboo Green (PG36), Daniel Smith Jadeite Genuine, Holbein Shadow Green (PBk31)
White gel pen (Pentel)

I almost never use blue... Except today I did. This ATC shows a typical spring flower that's everywhere these days: Scilla, sometimes in German also called 'Blaustern' (blue star). It also happens to be one of my mother's favorite flowers. :) I had a lot of fun with the composition.



Materials I used:
Stillman&Birn Zeta Series sketchbook (270 g/m²)
Watercolors: Schmincke Horadam YInMn-Blau, LUKAS Türkis (PB16), White Nights Burnt Umber (PBr7), Phoenix Yellow Ochre (PY42), Turner Permanent Lemon (PY109), ROSA Gallery Magenta Rose (PR122)
White gel pen (Pentel)

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