An Even Bigger Big Machine

6/5/13 Platinum Carbon ink, watercolor, Stillman & Birn Alpha sketchbook

In the past couple months, I’ve sketched a Komatsu digging machine, some other kind of orange digging machine, and a big yellow one. I also sketched an orange crane. I know it must seem like I have a special interest in heavy equipment, and I didn’t think I did. But I find myself compelled to sketch them, nonetheless.

 

Today Greg wanted to photograph activity at the launch pit for Big Bertha, the tunnel-boring machine, so I went with him to sketch this humongous crane with CenturyLink Field in the background. I knew I had to scale it carefully, or it wouldn’t fit on a double-page spread, and even so, it barely fit. After I finished the sketch, the crane lifted the semi-circular-shaped thing in the foreground and placed it into the pit.