A tour of one of my USK Chicago Symposium Sketchbooks

Before I went to Chicago for this year's Urban Sketcher's Symposium, I made two coptic-bound sketchbooks (here is a great how to video if you want to learn how to make one) from my favorite watercolor paper - Fabriano Artistico in both 140 lb. soft- and cold-pressed finishes. While both were about 8" x 11" in dimension, I made one in landscape format and the other in portrait format. I think I generally prefer landscape format as this was the one I finished first after coming back home.

Here is a quick tour of the sketchbook with my sketches from the USK Symposium at the start - including sketches done on my own in Chicago, sketches from the group sketch crawls, and sketches from the workshops I took there with Marc Taro Holmes, LK Bing, Marion Rivolier, and Liz Steel.

I'd love to hear your thoughts! Stay tuned for more posts on the individual workshops I took in Chicago as well as the demo from Stephanie Bower on Watery Reflections.

My First Narrated Sketchbook Tour

I posted another quick sketchbook tour on Instagram, but decided to add a narrated sketchbook tour as well. This was done all in one take and was obviously not practiced - but, I thought I'd give it a try. I'd love to hear your thoughts on it! Here are both tours.

Sketchbook No. 29 Tour

Yesterday, I completed my hand-bound sketchbook no. 29 - which is a 7" x 7" square sketchbook comprised of various watercolor papers: Fabriano Artistico 140 lb. soft-press paper; Saunders 140 lb. rough-press paper; and Strathmore 140 lb. cold-press paper.

Here is a quick tour of the sketchbook with a slower tour below.

Completed Sketchbook No. 27

Here is a tour of my most recently completed sketchbook (no. 27) with artwork completed from 12/11/16 to 01/13/17. I hope you enjoy! I would appreciate any comments.

A quick tour of Sketchbook no. 27

A tour of my completed Sketchbook no. 27 with artwork done from 12/11/16 to 01/13/17.

Tours of Sketchbook No. 25

I just finished sketchbook no. 25! Here is a quick tour followed by a longer view.

A slower tour.

Latest Sketchbook tours

Here's a slower tour of my most recently completed sketchbook no. 15 with artwork from 08.23.16 to 10.02.16.

And a quick tour.

Making Local Color Palettes

I recently picked up a copy of Mimi Robinson's book, Local Color - Seeing Place Through Watercolor at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SF MOMA). I had seen the book before at the de Young Museum and was intrigued.

In this book, Mimi Robinson creates watercolor palettes of locations both local to the San Francisco Bay Area where she lives (specifically, near Point Reyes, an area I love) and at other locations she's visited around the world. The palettes, themselves, are beautiful.

On my recent camping trip to Steeo Ravine, I made similar palettes for the scenes I was about to paint. But, I did these as preparatory steps, rather than as a means in itself.

After reading Local Color, though, I decided I should concentrate on making palettes as a way to focus on really seeing and mixing colors accurately. Also, the book has some great practices to keep inspiring me.

Here are some palettes I made recently. I am planning on making a palette and (possibly doing a painting if I have time) of the view from my balcony for the next five days at about the same time - shortly after sunrise.

I decided to make a palette for the wedding flowers we delivered in Napa the other day.

Inspired by the book, I made a palette for a rock from my backyard. It's amazing how many colors are in a rock when you really look.

Then, I tried unsuccessfully to paint the afternoon sky and couldn't get the clouds right. So, I focused on making a palette for the sky instead.

Have you ever tried making watercolor palettes of local color?

My Dogs in a New Sketchbook

I took a trip to the art store today and bought a few full (22" x 30") sheets of Fabriano Artistico paper in 140 lb. weights and a variety of finishes - hot press, cold press, and rough. Inspired by Cathy Johnson's no see folded journal video on YouTube and Esther K. Smith's Making Books book- I folded and cut the full sheet into two new sketchbooks.

I've been enjoying using a square format for my sketchbooks lately, so I cut down the full sheet into a 22 x 22" square and then folded it in half several times until I had a 5.5" x 5.5" sketchbook.

With the remaining paper, I made a little 3.5" x 4.5" accordion sketchbook.

To inaugurate my new sketchbook, I painted my dogs from some photos I took a little while ago.

I can't wait to show you the completed sketchbook! Stay tuned.

Sketching in the City

My daughter, Chloe, and I had a day to kill while our car was being worked on in Berkeley the other day, so we took BART to San Francisco and spent the day sightseeing, doing a little homework, and sketching.

We first stopped for a coffee and hot chocolate at the Ferry Building. Here is my sketch looking out at the ferry that came in from Marin.

Then, we walked towards Chinatown and stopped at this little playground in Sue Bierman Park.

Looking towards Pier 1 at Sue Bierman Park

We picked up some Pusheen items in Chinatown for my daughter - then went to Caffe Trieste in North Beach to do some math homework for her. She was not too happy doing her homework, but got to do a little more shopping afterwards!

Finished Sketchbook 13!

My homemade sketchbook no. 13 is complete! I created it with 140 lb. 6" x 9" watercolor paper and bound it by hand with Coptic stitching. I started it on July 8, 2016 and finished it today. 😊

Here is a quick view of the sketchbook tour.

Quick tour of Sketchbook #13

And a more leisurely tour.

Urban sketching in Point Richmond & San Francisco

After driving my daughter and her friend out to Point Richmond for their summer school program, I tried some "real" urban sketching - setting up my lawn chair and sketching The Plunge (Richmond Municipal Natatorium) and the tunnel leading to Ferry Point. But, the wind coming through the tunnel chilled me to the bone! And after an hour or so, I had to retreat into Starbucks to finish painting my drawing.

This building is commonly known as The Plunge. It was built in 1925 by John Nicholl, who unsuccessfully drilled for oil on this lot but donated the land to the city for a swimming pool after drilling to a depth of 1,232 feet and finding nothing but water. Today, it is powered by a solar heating system, with 200 operable Windows to dehumidify and circulate air and water cleaned by UV light rather than chemicals and uses salt water.

Here is the drawing with a photo.

After warming up, I found a sunny spot to sketch and tried using Marc Taro Holmes's single line sketching technique (not lifting my Platinum Preppy extra fine fountain pen), adding brush pen and then watercolors.

This little building housed a coal, wood, hay, and grain delivery business starting in 1903 and became the Richmond Supply Co. in 1911. It now houses the Point Richmond History Museum.

Next, I had 15 minutes before I needed to pick the kids. So, I tried a speedy drawing using my Pentel brush pen and watercolors.

This is the old Bank of Richmond building built in 1902. It now houses a realty office.

Yesterday, I tried an urban sketch sitting in Patricia's Green in Hayes Valley, San Francisco after getting my husband a new pair of glasses at Warby Parker. Even though I tried to sketch fast with my Kuretake sable brush pen, I decided to attempt a panorama view across my sketchbook (6" x 18").

I was able to add some, but not all of my watercolors on site.

I will be doing more urban sketches soon. Have you tried any?

Finished Moleskine Sketchbook!

I work on several sketchbooks at a time generally. This sketchbook was started back in January and I finally finished it today! I always love the feeling of completing a sketchbook!

Here is a quick view of the sketchbook.

And a slower tour of the same sketchbook.

Finished Travel Sketchbook!

I finally completed the travel sketchbook I made for my trip to Paris, London & Barcelona. I really enjoyed sketching on the trip and even drawing from my photos once I got home. It really let me relive my trip again!

Here is a quick tour of my sketchbook and a more leisurely one below that.

A slower sketchbook tour.

Final Pages of my Travel Sketchbook

This summer, my 9 year old is attending "Camp Mom" - which means I am entertaining her most days while Chloe completes a year's worth of math with her teacher's tutoring. After math today, we worked on using Marc Taro Holmes's continuous single line sketching for some of our urban travel sketches.

We used a timer and drew all 4 of these sketches within 20 minutes. We added brush pen and watercolors afterwards.

Chloe did great with her own sketches but soon got tired. I finished my travel sketchbook with this last view out of the airplane before landing at SFO.

I'm a little sad to be done with this travel sketchbook. But on to the next!

Illustrated Travel Journaling

In an attempt to document and remember our European trip, I put together these illustrated journal pages in my travel sketchbook. In this first page, I added in illustrations of our special pastries from the Balthazar x Bobbi Brown afternoon tea in London.

Afternoon tea at Balthazar in collaboration with Bobbi Brown.

These next three pages document the excellent Sidewalk Food Tour we took in Paris in the Latin Quarter.

And this page documents Day 1 of our trip.

Completing Travel Sketches

These two sketches were started opinion Barcelona and finished here in California. Some day, I hope to get quicker with my urban sketches so that I can finish more on site! Always looking to improve!

Church of Santa Maria del Mar in Born, Barcelona

Our last meal in Barcelona - tapas at Artesans in El Born

Have you tried urban sketching on a vacation?

Travel Sketches

I just got back from a family vacation to Paris, London, and Barcelona. I tried to do some urban sketching while on the trip and made a sketchbook just for my travel,sketches. It was pretty fpdifficult to find time to sketch while on the move with my family, so I ended up taking a ton of reference photos for sketches that I will do in my studio on my return. The artwork below were done on the trip. As well as portraits for my 100 day portrait project, but I will post those separately.