Some sketches Japan inspired.

     

After spending the week practicing shapes, pen tools and more boring stuff, today I gave my self the gift of doing something more fun and freehand . 

Here is what I did, two sketches inspired once again by our Japan trip.

They are both done with pen on a bamboo tablet. 

Still plenty of room for improvement but I am enjoying this beginning already :)

Totally easier using pen and paper of course, in fact at first I sketched in the traditional way then I re-did digitally :)

Quick oil painting study: Audrey by the lake, with palette knife

5x7 inches

oil on canvas, with palette knife

My Illustrator studies are going better…I have to admit :) ...I am almost enjoying it!

But sometimes I just HAVE TO paint.

Play loud music, grab my brushes and start putting some color on my canvas.

Today I chose a tiny canvas, 5x7 inches, and I mainly used the palette knife, to create the tree and the water texture.

A very quick study, maybe I will do a larger painting out of this image …maybe not…who knows:) ?

Time to go back to my Mac now….Have a good day every one!

Audrey by the lake, Sketch

Black ink, pen and white gouache on toned paper.

I really enjoyed exploring different techniques for the same image…maybe this one is my favorite, with stronger contrasts.

Time for dinner and relax, it has been a long day!! :)

Camping, quite evening.Sketch

Ink Pen and white pencil on toned paper.

Same photo as yesterday, different technique.

Drawing this sketch was my relaxing moment of the day after fighting with Illustrator and its meshing tools all afternoon.

I am curious to try to sketch this picture with black ink and white gouache too…keeping this for tomorrow though:)

Time to go back to my study now…just a little bit more! :(

Camping by the lake. Sketch

Sketch with pen on toned paper

This weekend we went water rafting and camping in Eldorado County…. a fun weekend.

Just before dinner I took this picture :

Valerie with her daughter….I thought it would make a very good sketch, but I wanted to have only one person to balance with the raft.

The location was really nice, I have few more pictures I want to sketch..hopefully tomorrow, between a class of Illustrator and the other ;) 

Pizza time for us over here, the best Sunday evening dinner!

Tokyo, Imperial palace before the rain. Quick study

Haven't been painting in a long time….probably this was my longest break ever since I started painting almost 4 years ago.
Glad I picked up my brushes again …need to go back into the habit.
Today I worked mainly with the palette knife though! But you got the point :)

Few weeks ago I drew a sketch I really liked

 (http://lauradallagata.blogspot.com/2014/06/tokyo-imperial-palace-sketch.html ) thinking  it would also do a good painting, here is the quick study of today: 

11x14 inches

quick study, 

oil on canvas

Tokyo, Imperial palace before the rain.

Back to my Illustrator now!!
I am so diligent….:) I am amazing my self :)

Life is not about finding your self, is about creating your self.

Life isn't about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.
-George Bernard Shaw-
I love this quote.

I believe that each individual's purpose in life is to draw their own map.
Is not easy and not comfortable but going off the chart is much more fun!

This wooden block lady is related with one of my recent experience: learning Illustrator, a very complicated (to me at least!) Adobe program.
I hated the beginning A LOT (and every time I get stack on something , too often!), but the more I keep going ( tempted to give up at least 3 times a day!) the more I am satisfied with my self and my progress.... so I ll keep up doing it.
Planning to painting a little bit today or tomorrow though! Need some old easy stuff too! :)

From the back:

  

Life is partly what WE make and partly is made by the FRIENDS we choose.

Today is post is dedicate to Naomi : happy birthday !!!

Since I have beeb in  a wooden block mood lately…. here is my gift to Naomi :)

 and back:

Another beautiful sunny day…such a shame staying inside to do my Illustrator studies :(
But I ll be watching the game at 3pm: GO ITALY!!!!

Have a beautiful Saturday everyone!

Start wherever you are and start small.

Sorry for not posting during this last week…but I have been VERY busy with life in general (!) and especially with my  recent learning challenge: Illustrator. It is giving me and hard time!
Took me a full day yesterday to get to draw a tree with this program…. well I am not posting the picture of it here!It didn't come that nice ;)

Out of frustration I went back to my comfortable wooden blocks collage.

Start wherever you are and start small.

I love this quote, very simple, very wise and very solution-focused.
Change can start anywhere and a small steps  approach is OK. :)

 It is so appropriate for me for right now! 

I am putting my beloved brushes aside for a little while and I am trying to learn ( and enjoy!) something that I don t really like that much …. like drawing and creating art with the computer.

I guess that as soon as I ll be able to do something more than a tree with it I ll be starting having fun!

Working this piece of wood energized me as much as the sunshine is doing today :)

I love touching my art, tearing papers a part, glueing it, adding colors making a mess and getting dirty with my hands. It so satisfying :)  Building layers and layers and more layers…. 

Start wherever you are and start small.

2.5x1.5x3.8 inches

mixed media on wood

Already in my Etsy shop!
Enjoy!

A street in the Gion district, Kyoto.

ink, pen, gouache and watercolor.

While transferring the Japan pictures from the camera to my pc I noticed that I took several pictures of this same street in different moment and in different days.

We took this picture last Saturday, after we got coffee in a place nearby, in the Gion district. My favorite part of Kyoto.

Another grey day here in Ocean Beach, totally missing the sun and the temperature from last week.

Driving to Carmel for the weekend, looking for some SUN!

Happy weekend everyone!

Tokyo Imperial Palace, sketch.

Back in San Francisco, missing the Japanese heat and most of all the sunshine.

This sketch was done from a picture we took while visiting the Imperial Palace garden in Tokyo.  That day the sky was like here today: grey. (But in Japan in was hot!)

Black ink and white gouache on toned paper.

In my sketch I combined two separate images: the castle, and the swan.

The ink and gouache was an experiment. I got the inspiration from a girl from my drawing class, she used to use them together a lot. ( thanks Fara!)

Planning to do a painting from this image….hopefully next week :) I really like the composition.

Finishing with laundry and cleaning up today, i hate the coming-back-with-tons-of-dirty-laundry part of the trip!

Sunday morning breakfast, in Roppongi Tokyo

This morning we went for breakfast in a coffee place nearby, we sat down next to the window.  All the windows were open and there was a nice warm breeze coming in.
35 C outside way too hot for us used to SF weather! :)

We sat down for an hour or so then we went to meet with some friends for lunch.
Nice day, last day.
Starting to missing Mona A LOT :) happy to go back tomorrow!