Complements

I was just about to head out for a drink & draw with USk Seattle at Project 9 Brewing Company. Needing a strong complement for this orange Uglybook, I had grabbed a bright blue Pilot Juice acrylic marker. Amazingly, a man (lower left corner) sat down nearby wearing a bright orange T-shirt and socks and blue shoes exactly the color of my ink! An imaginary high-5 to him for his good color sense! 

Fuzzy Portraits

 

9/15/24 Bubba (reference photo by Linda Lee)

8/20/24 Benoit (reference photo by Joanne Tam)

Although I haven’t done a concentration of pet portraits since spring, I still have occasions to do them, and I enjoy having subject matter to keep up my colored pencil chops.

 Last month I wanted to make a surprise gift for a friend, the human who belongs to the pup named Benoit. What a sweet face!

The cat was a commission from a friend who wanted to give the portrait to her mother in memory of Bubba, who had recently crossed the rainbow bridge. Pets who are gone are always special subjects for me, even if I didn’t know the pet personally.

Sometimes I’m lucky enough to sketch a pet live under relatively leisurely circumstances. Visiting a resident at Aegis Living, the fuzzy pup (whose name I didn’t learn) was mostly captive on a lap, giving me a bit of time to sketch.

8/17/24 A fuzzy visitor at Aegis

Damp Fun on the Lynnwood Light Rail

9/25/24 First ride on the Lynnwood Link Extension

With all the new light rail stations opening this year, I’m having a hard time keeping up, but I’m trying my darndest! The latest to open are the four stations north of Northgate that comprise the Lynnwood Link Extension.

Undeterred by the rainy forecast, Roy, Mary Jean and I met up in the Roosevelt neighborhood for an early lunch, then caught the train northward. Hopping off at each new station, we looked around to see what each offered (ultimately, not much in terms of amenities) and sketched. We continued all the way to Lynnwood City Center, the current northernmost station on the 1 Line.

The first couple of stations were just drizzly, but later we had full-on rain with some strong wind gusts. Fortunately, the stations offered enough shelter that our sketches stayed (mostly) dry. By the time we got to the final station, we were all ready for a coffee warm-up, but sadly, no such venue was within a 15-minute walking distance. When we asked, a security officer mentioned a “coffee stand” a few minutes away – but with no sheltered seating.

9/25/24 At upper left was a strange structure visible from the South Shoreline Station platform . . . art? 

While restrooms are available at all Lynnwood Extension stations (unusual for the light rail system; in Seattle, almost none of the stations have one), they are locked. To gain access, you push a button to call an off-site attendant, who enables access remotely. The hummingbird art at far right was hastily sketched at the last station, when we all wished we could go somewhere for coffee.

Ruefully laughing that we would need to return to “civilization” for coffee, we got back on the train southward and ended up where we began – in the Roosevelt neighborhood – for coffee and treats at Caffe Ladro.

No matter the weather or lack of amenities, nothing is more fun than a new sketching adventure with good friends!

Intrepid sketchers!

Straight to Red

9/24/24 Green Lake neighborhood

Since I always have trees on my mind during the fall color season, I thought it would be fun to combine that theme with my ongoing street trees project. Conveniently, Taha Ebrahimi’s book, Street Trees of Seattle, has a good index, so I looked up some types of trees I knew to have good fall color. I thought it might be too early for most maples except Japanese, but a bigleaf was just on the south end of Green Lake – an easy drive to see how it was doing.

As I suspected, its color was disappointing. However, just a block or so away, I found a different type of maple. I don’t know its variety, but I’m familiar with the way that it skips yellow and orange and goes straight to red with a silvery underside to the leaves. Right next to it was another tree that was going from lime to lemon.

Crepe myrtle

Meanwhile, a bunch of crepe myrtle shrubs growing nearby were stealing the color show with their brilliant magenta flowers and berries. When most flowers are long past, they are just getting started. I noted their location so I can go back soon to sketch them, too. I love this time of year!

Wedgwood and Greenwood Street Trees

 

9/2/24 Wedgwood neighborhood (I've enjoyed sketching a variety of oaks in Wedgwood. I always had a certain shape of leaf in mind when I thought of "oak trees," but I've discovered that the shapes can vary widely.)

My street trees project is winding down for the season (until the weather forces me to sketch from my car, which I’m not sure will always be possible with street trees, but I’ll try). Here are a few more from the Wedgwood and Greenwood neighborhoods.

9/10/24 Wedgwood neighborhood

9/13/24 Greenwood neighborhood

My Walking Sketch Journal

8/15/24 Maple Leaf

My walk-sketch fitness program has become such an integral part of my life (for five years now) that it comes almost naturally. The cold/wet weather days ahead, though, are always a challenge. An additional motivator since I began trying to get back into a sketch journal habit is that whatever I sketch on my walks becomes an easy journal entry for the day. I usually add a written observation (or sometimes thoughts I don’t share that are easy to crop out somewhere on the page), and it’s done. That’s so much easier than sitting down with my sketchbook at the end of the day, trying to think of something to sketch retroactively.

8/24/24 Maple Leaf

Once the rain sets in, I have to think of new ways to maintain the habit. There’s always the waterproof Field Notes Expedition and my rainy-day sketch kit. But another thing I might try is to continue thinking as I always do when I walk/sketch during good weather, looking for things that catch my eye, but instead of sketching on the spot, I’ll snap a photo to sketch from later. Knowing I have that photo to work from would make that end-of-day sketch journaling so much easier. (I know that’s probably a no-brainer work-around for most people, but my auto-mode is so strongly tuned to urban sketching that I have to constantly remind myself that using photo references is another option.)

These walk-sketches from August and September were all done on location.

9/4/24 Ravenna and Green Lake

9/5/24 Maple Leaf

9/12/24 Maple Leaf

9/21/24 Maple Leaf (This was only my second sketch with my new fall palette, but I already didn't like the green I chose for the sunny side of trees... it's too cool. I've switched back to my favorite warm green Caran d'Ache for the next one.)

9/22/24 Maple Leaf

Urban Cookies

Sketches digitally printed with edible ink onto cookies made by Joan Matsukawa.

My sketches have appeared on a T-shirt, on a poster, and in a cookbook. I’m always flattered and honored to see my work published in any form, but with my pastry tooth, you can imagine how thrilled I was to have my sketches reproduced on cookies.

Joan Matsukawa contacted me recently after she had spotted my sketches of Obon dancers and taiko drummers that I had made at Seattle Betsuin’s Obon festival several years back. She asked permission to digitally print them onto cookies she would bake to sell at Aloha Stadium’s Megabon event in Honolulu. Happy to support any Obon celebration, of course I said yes! After the event, she sent these to me all the way from Honolulu. Thank you, Joan!

I'm not sure I've ever turned down a cookie, but alas, I can't have my cookie and eat it, too!

Hendrix Park on a Lovely Fall Day

 

9/21/24 Jimi Hendrix Park

The first time USk Seattle met at Jimi Hendrix Park, it was brand new in 2017. We hadn’t been back since. My memory hazy of everything except what I’d sketched previously, it all seemed fresh last Saturday. For my first sketch (at the top of the first panel above), I chose the part of the curving sculpture where Jimi’s silhouette is cut out. I walked back and forth and sideways until I found the perfect spot to frame downtown Seattle through the hole.

Making a loop around the park, I was surprised to discover Judkins Park Light Rail Station still under construction. Although I know that more northend stations are scheduled for the future, I didn’t know about this southend station, which is opening next year.

To fill the page spread, I made two small sketches showing a distant view of the same curving sculpture honoring Jimi (and Mark and David in the foreground) and the abstract vermilion-colored sculpture prominently featured in the park. I never learned its name the first time I sketched it in 2017, and I still couldn’t find its name this time, either.

The partly cloudy morning gave way to full sun by noon, and it was the kind of fall afternoon that I always hope for in September (but often don’t get).

All morning I had pondered which kind of poke I would get for lunch at Seattle Fish Guys, which is only a few minutes away from the park. It’s a good thing I fortified myself there for the grueling drive home, which took nearly an hour (compared to the drive down to the park in the morning, which took only 15 minutes). Fortunately, I had the top down (and it was the Miata’s 28^th birthday that day, to boot), which makes even a bad commute a bit more bearable.

9/21/24 Seattle Fish Guys

Seward Park Poplars

 

8/18/24 Seward Park

After an errand nearby last week, I made a quick stop at Seward Park on the south end of Lake Washington. I thought it might be too early for color, and I didn’t see much. I love this stand of poplars, though, on the lakeshore. I remembered well the last time I had sketched them years ago, also in September. It was during Kathleen Moore’s nature drawing class.

Back in 2018, I had taken most of the whole class to draw with leisurely graphite. Last Wednesday I was short on time, so I took only a few minutes, but the rhythm of these trees still makes a naturally pleasing composition.

Handbound Hahnemühle

 

I stickered up the cover with Notegeist Bindery's stickers!

When I use wet media, my hands-down favorite sketchbook for more than a year has been Hahnemühle with 100 percent cotton paper. The A6 size has been the most portable and actually the only practical size with my everyday-carry mini-size Rickshaw bag. My only complaint with the otherwise excellent edition is that it only comes hardbound, and the sturdy covers add to the weight and bulk.

My favorite A6-size Hahnemühle that is, unfortunately, available only in hardcover.

When I discovered that Hahnemühle offers the same paper in watercolor blocks, I started thinking about hand binding again. (For those coming late to my blog, I used to hand-bind my sketchbooks for many years. This tag will take you to all the posts related to my bookbinding; this post explains why I stopped bookbinding.) Cut the 9-by-12-inch paper in half, fold, and stitch or staple into thinner, lighter A6-ish books – it seemed like an ideal solution.

The price, too, was appealing: An A6 Hahnemühle works out to be about $0.26 per page (I’ve found the best prices at St. Louis Art Supply). Making my own books from blocks of paper would be about $0.18 a page. Last spring I bought and cut a block of paper with this intention, but then good outdoor-sketching weather happened. Around the same time, I had become focused on making on-location comics in Uglybooks. In any case, I never got around to binding.

Hahnemühle at left compared to Uglybook

I was chatting about all this with a friend one day – a friend who had recently started a notebook-making business. Gary thought it would be an interesting opportunity to try some custom prototypes with different binding styles. I provided the paper, and he got to work.

An immediate issue he discovered was the paper’s thickness. I realized a long time ago that this is probably the reason softbound sketchbooks with heavy paper are rare – Stillman & Birn is the only one I can think of (and I loved and used them for many years). Glue bindings are often insufficient for thick pages (as we found out from one of the prototypes), and even stapling can be difficult.

Hand-stitching, which would have been my only option if I had done it myself, turned out to be the best solution after all. I’m now using the first prototype, and it’s working out beautifully. With 24 pages, it’s about the same size and thickness as an Uglybook, half the thickness of a hardcover Hahnemühle and much lighter in weight, too. This single-signature form is so simple that I may just have to go back to binding my own after all.

By the way, if you’d like to see some of the handmade notebooks Gary sells in his shop, check out Notegeist Bindery. (Mine, however, were made just for me!)

Commemorative note: Thirteen years ago today, I started drawing. Usually on the anniversary of that date, I write a retrospective or introspective post about practice, process, learning and other thoughts about drawing and creativity. Last year’s post on Murphy’s Laws of Urban Sketching is one of my favorites. Drawing has become such an integral part of my life that I can’t think of anything new to say about why this daily practice is so much more to me than a hobby. Today I’ll just say, Happy drawing anniversary to me! I’m happy that I started 13 years ago, and even happier that I kept going.

The same as my favorite Hahnemühle but lighter and thinner

First Green Lake Color (and Fresh Fall Palette)

 

9/16/24 Green Lake

As mentioned a few days ago, I have embraced the coming of fall, and what better way to do that than to check out my favorite sweet gums at Green Lake? They were only just beginning to show some yellow and orange at their very tops, and the mid-afternoon light caught them well. In another month, they’ll be at their peak.

Color notes: Also as mentioned previously, it was time to freshen my watercolor pencil palette, especially since I hadn’t been using it much with my minimal-color comics approach lately. Instead of the CYM triad I’ve been in love with the past couple of years, I chose a more traditional primary triad as well as a secondary triad with two greens – one warm, one cool. I don’t need to mix much with this complete rainbow, though I did mix the secondary triad to see what it’s like.

The pencils are all Caran d’Ache Museum Aquarelles plus a couple of Derwent Inktense. I had gotten a little too dependent on my go-to colors, so it was fun to shake things up by changing every watercolor pencil in my usual palette. I’m a little uncertain about the warm green I chose – Inktense Olivine (1340) – which isn’t as warm as my all-time favorite Museum 245. But it’s good to shake things up  – even in the more traditional direction!

New fall palette

Stronger than a Donut

 

9/13/24 Project 9 Brewing Co., Maple Leaf neighborhood

After a long week of home-improvement project delays, issues and inconveniences, I needed something stronger than a donut. I asked Ching if she would come out for an impromptu drink & draw at Project 9 Brewing Company. A little brew, a little sketching and a lot of good conversation will do wonders for one’s first world problems.

Thanks for listening to my first world problems, Ching!

This was the first time I sat in the brewery’s outdoor seating area during inclement weather, and we stayed dry and cozy under the heated shelter. We could have gone inside, but it’s much quieter outdoors (plus dogs to sketch). It also helped to eat a huge pile of stir-fried noodles from Tummy Yummy Thai’s food truck. The last time I had opted for a stir fry from Tummy’s, the temps were in the mid-80s that July day, and the steaming hot noodles, though delicious, were not a good choice. Last Friday, they were just right.

Sammich, the other food truck that used to vend regularly at Project 9, apparently closed abruptly last month. I’m going to miss their fantastic grilled cheese sandwiches.

Jack is Back

9/13/24 Maple Leaf neighborhood

Jack is back! Jack Skellington, that is – Maple Leaf’s celebrity pumpkin. A couple of years ago, the 969-pound pumpkin was featured on KING 5 Evening, a local variety TV show. Kate and I sketched him during the weighing-in event that turned out to be Maple Leaf’s highlight of the year. Last year I sketched Jack’s successor, who didn’t grow quite as large and eventually succumbed to too much love (sitting and touching by visitors).

Jack’s grower has been busy cultivating the next-gen Jack. When they were featured in our community newsletter, I knew it was time to sketch him. He was under 700 pounds at his most recent weigh-in, but he still has a lot of growing to do before Halloween. I’ll be ready.

Material notes: My annual season of denial is over, and I’ve fully embraced fall – which  means I’ve put color back into my bag! As much as I love making comics pages in Uglybooks, I’ve been jonesin’ for full color for a while now, so it wasn’t hard to do. Right now it’s the basic watercolor pencil palette I used last year, but as the fall color season progresses, I’ll probably shake things up. Although I’ll still be using an Uglybook for my daily journal sketches, I’m also daily-carrying my favorite 100 percent cotton Hahnemühle again – in a new form factor. Stay tuned for more on that soon.

Basement Stairway Construction

 

9/11/24 Metropolitan Market, Crown Hill neighborhood

Just like urban sketching reflects where we live and where we travel, the contents of sketch journals and diary comics reflect whatever is going on in our day-to-day lives. I’m probably stating the obvious: While I usually find it challenging to maintain a sketch journal when my life is ordinary, my pages are prolific on days when a lot is happening. Even when I’m so busy with the “lot happening” that I hardly have time to sketch, I always find time to document what I want to remember about the day. The visual elements don’t necessarily even illustrate the activities; instead, they indicate the break I took to record.

On this day, I was moving all my clothes and shoes from my closet to another room (where they were piled in a heap on the floor) so that the carpet could be removed and replaced with new flooring. Meanwhile, a contractor was noisily rebuilding our basement stairway. When he warned me that in a few moments he would be doing something that would sound like six gunshots, I decided it was time to leave for a lunch break.

(By the way, when all of this is done, I plan to make a post showing before/after photos of these home-improvement projects that have been occupying my time.)

Color note: As simple as it looks, that cup of coffee was a fun color-mixing challenge. I stopped carrying brown in any medium years ago, so if I need brown, I must mix it. Since the paper was green, all I needed was dark purple and orange – my all-purpose secondary triad.

Urban Sketchers on the Eastside Rail Line

 

9/14/24 Redmond Technology and Wilburton stations

Late last spring, Kate, Roy and I rode the new Link light rail line 2 from south Bellevue to Redmond. Getting off at each station, we sketched briefly before hopping back on. In addition to simply having fun, we were also scouting the route for a potential USk outing. Since most stations have enough sheltered areas that the outing could work during transitional seasons, we pushed it to fall.

As it turned out, Saturday’s drizzle didn’t faze any of the enthusiastic sketchers who showed up. In fact, I was impressed and surprised by the number of sketchers who did exactly what Kate, Roy and I did. Blitz-sketching at each station, they got right back on when the next train came and made it to the northern-most Redmond station in time for the throwdown!

Making one stop at Warburton Station to grab lunch at Whole Foods, I made a quick sketch of the light rail supports, which always make an interesting composition. After that, since I already did the whole tour in May, I saved most of my sketching time for Redmond Technology Station. Microsoft’s extensively landscaped pedestrian/bike overpass is challenging fun to sketch. (Both sketches above.)

Sketcher Jyoti works for Microsoft in one of the many buildings on the tech company’s main campus on the far end of the overpass. Walking with me, she noted key points of interest, such as the archway behind the colorful Microsoft “windows” (likely a good selfie spot for new employees and visitors). The triangular structure covered with foliage is a cave-like space where employees can take a break from all the glass and concrete. At lower left is a distant view of the pedestrian overpass. (Sketches below.)

Microsoft's main campus, Redmond

After the throwdown, most of us rode the train back to the southend park-and-ride lot, so I had time to sketch a few of my co-sketchers as well as other commuters. A fun day!

A green escape from glass and concrete

Blood Pressure Control

 

9/10/24 Sketched from live broadcast

Political debates can be difficult to view, and presidential ones are certainly among the worst. I find that it helps to calm me when I sketch from the live broadcast. I can still listen (though often I wish I couldn’t), but focusing on capturing the candidates’ likeness (or lack thereof!) keeps my blood pressure down.

Last week’s debate between Harris and Trump was the fourth presidential debate that I have sketched. I think my first (between Clinton and Trump in 2016) is still my most memorable due to my special viewing “seat.” I also sketched the 2020 debacle and the one a couple months ago.