At least our local cafe is still where we left it! Inspired to continue my use of PS Touch, while keeping in mind some of the other suggestions on how to make your sketches more interesting, I made this image.
Cafe Wednesday – legs, 19 February 2014.
I think there’s some way to go yet!
I’m flitting around trying out a whole lot of different drawing techniques at present. I have several drawing programs on my phablet (Galaxy Note2), the S-Note program which is what I usually draw with and I also have the PS Touch (Photoshop) app. I use regular Photoshop quite a bit so the PS Touch is reasonably familiar, or will be once I can find where all the tools are located! Anyway I was prompted by this post to give my PS Touch app another go. Another artist I find has a particularly interesting e-drawing style is 3eCheval from Quebec. I love the stripped back quality of her work which reminds me of screen prints.
My first effort with the PS Touch turned out just like one of my S-Note drawings, mainly because I wasn’t thinking enough about utilising the layering process.
Painting with door. 18 February 2014
I think my second drawing, if not an artistic masterpiece, at least used the layers to better effect. I was able to erase back to different layers and I found swapping between layers much easier than on my big computer.
PS Touch drawing 18 February 2014.
I suppose at this early stage of e-drawing my biggest suggestion would be that if you are using a stylus to draw, select the finer ‘pen’ settings to draw with. I at least find them a lot easier to control than larger size ‘pens’ and ‘brushes’.
Oh no, one of my favourite cafes is closed for renovation! So today I had to find a new place to draw. I’m also drawing on my new book. I’ve been doing a bit of re-cycling of old magazines and envelopes to make drawing surfaces. This square-ish book has been made from a magazine which promotes its ‘green’ credentials, so I feel well justified in re-using its pages. Anyway here is the new view.
The view from the new cafe.
I drew this while waiting for a friend last week. I was intrigued by the complex repetition of the metal trellis supporting a roof covering part of the plaza I was sitting in (and yes there was a cafe umbrella involved).
Metal roof support (and a cafe umbrella), 14 February 2014.
But the more I looked the more confused I became. From the angle I was sitting at the geometry was proving difficult to understand. So I ended up drawing one of the connection joints.
Joint for metal roof support, 14 February 2014.
It’s always a challenge to come up with a new ‘take’ for Cafe Wednesday drawing. Among the many drawing blogs that are now available online I’ve read an interesting post from UK illustrator Lynne Chapman, on Sketches that Sing. Lynne suggests several ways to free up your sketching. I’ve used her approach that ignores ‘local’ colour and instead draws the focus of the sketch in warm colours and the remainder of the work in cool colours. The idea is that if you get your tones right then you can pretty much do what you like with colour.
Cafe Wednesday, tonal study, 12 February 2014.
While I still need to work on my composition aspect, I’m liking the colour approach.
leonieandrews 