Rain and Shine

 

11/5/20 Maple Leaf neighborhood (The Mitsubishi bicolor
turns out to be more water-soluble than I thought!)

Sunshine, clouds, rain – every condition offers different sketching challenges. It’s not as much fun to sketch without light and deep shadows, but I’m not picky on my daily walks.

Technical note: A few weeks ago when I was sketching in the drizzle, I discovered that I didn’t have any colored pencils with me that weren’t water-soluble – bad news on a wet day. I went home and immediately looked through my harder colored pencils (which work better on the Field Notes Expedition’s Yupo pages) to pick out a few key hues for my daily-carry. A Mitsubishi vermilion/Prussian blue bicolor is a favorite from my red/blue bicolor experiments, so I thought it would be an expeditious choice. It’s not supposed to be water-soluble (though I admit I’d never tested it with water). On a wet day last week (at left), I found that it is – at least partly.

After I’ve done a few more sketches in the rain to get the kinks like that one out, I’ll show you my inclement weather sketch kit.

10/14/20 Overcast but not colorless.

10/15/20 Sunny but hard to sketch
when my subject leaves before I'm done.

Rain can be inconvenient, but it brings out the best in the colors of foliage. (All photos taken Nov. 5, 2020, in Maple Leaf.)

Look at all those trash cans... I regret that I
didn't sketch this!