Example today. I did finally get to the studio this afternoon after a walk and brunch at wonderful Attenborough nature reserve (More of that tomorrow), But instead of going on with the irises painting, I was sidetracked by something I've got involved with on Twitter.
They have these great ongoing daily sketching challenges. There was #stilldecember last month and now it's #sketchjanuary. People upload work they've done that day. To be honest I don't really know how it works yet as, with Twitter, nobody can explain much in 140 words, so I'm at a loss, but I'm just joining in anyway!
Anything that makes you sketch and draw daily is a good thing, so even though it has that ring of "showing off" to it, well who cares if it makes you produce work and practise?
So I started a sketch last night from a photo that I've had hanging around for ages and keep looking at thinking, hmmm that's nice, would make a nice watercolour. Here it is
Lovely isn't it with the sunshine showing up the daffs and the long shadows. So I got involved with this and found it was very complicated for a start and then discovered lots of other things. Such as how difficult drawing is when you want to introduce tone and shadows. What about local colour? How do you show the colour of the darker trumpets without a handy wash of pigment? How do you differentiate the local colour from the different tones?
Come back watercolour all is forgiven! But it just goes to show that you...or I actually...have to keep practising all the different disciplines, not just watercolour to keep up the skill set.
Anyway here's my drawing. I'm calling it a tonal sketch for a watercolour, which gives me loads of excuses for bad work! (I also took the photo practically in the dark on this wintry afternoon so there's another excuse!)
But look out for more sketches as I have to keep up with my social media obligations, you know!