Showering at the City Beach in Nice, France
This is a quick sketch of people along the city beach using pencil on a small sheet of multimedia paper. Later at the hotel I added color with Procreate and used Snapseed to strengthen the texture.
Hiking through the Porquerolles Island Forest
Proquerolles has pine and acacia woods spread across the island, between its fields of olive and grape. This sketch is about the feeling of walking in one of these woods during the intense heat of July. Although the trees and shadows are not really purple, the contrast of bright light and shadow somehow gives the feeling of purple, a kind of protection from the sunlight pouring down just beyond the edge of the trees.
This is a Procreate sketch.
At the Beach
All I did today was this one sketch- and a lot of tourist activities besides.
I am working on showing light in the sea, that is, the reflections of the sky, the people and the waves. I did not yet get the results I wanted but have a plan to try again tomorrow.
This is a pencil, multimedia paper and Procreate sketch.
Prepping for Tomorrow
The conference center where we are staying in France has very limited internet access. You have to go to an outside terrace next to a bar and then hope you are lucky and get a connection. This forces me to write and post in a more social setting than I usually work in, which turned out well for me this evening.
When I came down this evening to post a sketch from the beach today, I sat near a small group sitting around a computer and doing last minute preparation for a presentation they are giving tomorrow. Perhaps because I have been working on light for the last few days, I immediately noticed the reflected light on their faces and how it contrasted with the evening sky. I also noticed how their body language showed cooperation around a common purpose. I quickly sketched them using Procreate as they worked and decided I liked this sketch better than the beach scene.
This is a Procreate sketch.
Backlit Figure
Because of the light here in Porquerolles, I found myself continuing to work on conveying brights. This sketch began as a simple line and wash drawing that I changed many times using Procreate. I worked through many versions of this drawing, varying the amount of dark by cropping parts out or just painting in portions darker. I was surprised that the feeling of bright light weakens if the darks are too dark. I also decided that the blurry portions on the sides of the sketch are necessary to show how the bright light makes it hard to see detail.
This is a pencil, watercolor and Procreate sketch.
People Watching along the Place d’Armes, Porquerolles
Sketching people is a form of people watching and what could be a better subject for a sketch that marks the completion of my first year of blogging? Today is the anniversary of my first Deliberate Sketching post from 2015 and during this year I became increasingly aware of how important observing and recording the details of a scene is to the meaning a sketch conveys. Sketching others in the process of observing somehow seemed a fitting topic for this landmark day. (I will have a post soon that summarizes my thinking about my progress in learning how to communicate visually.)
In this sketch I worked on body language and the feeling of summer. The body language of the two figures in the foreground shows a kind of idle interest in the people off to the right. The way one figure leans forward while the other tilts her head back around her friend shows their curiosity. Their calm posture suggests that they are not invested emotionally in what they are seeing, they are just resting a bit and watching others.
I also wanted to show the summer heat in this sketch, which I was definitely feeling. The sun is really bright here in Porquerolles France, so bright that even with sunglasses on I saw blobs of red, white and black swimming around as I drew. I used strong purples in the shadows and backlit the figures on the right to replicate the feeling of intense heat.
This is a pencil and watercolor sketch on multimedia paper.
Stopping between Trains
We had an hour between trains in Toulon, on our way to Porquerolles, and made use of it with a quick bite and sketch at the Terminus across from the station. It was a slow point in the afternoon and the staff stood at the bar chatting with each other and a single customer.
My attention was caught by their ease with each other and by the way the reds of the decor were reflected in the faces of the figures.
This is a pencil and watercolor sketch on multimedia paper.
Deliberate Sketching 