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| My everyday-carry urban palette |
By
the time you read this, I will be somewhere in Yosemite National Park! Yosemite has been on my bucket list ever
since I first saw Ansel Adams’ Moon and Half Dome decades ago. I
don’t know why it took us so long to bring it up to the top of our list, but we’re
finally there!
Although
I always take a look at my sketch kit before I travel, I didn’t need to make
any major changes – my everyday-carry sketch kit has been a lean machine (both at home and away) for quite some time
now.
The
one thing I seriously reviewed, however, was my colored pencil palette. Going
from my typical urban palette to Yosemite’s granite, waterfalls and sequoias took
a bit of thinking. As I always do before I travel, I did a little Google image
research of the landscape I would be seeing – in this case, the Sierra Nevada. Of
course, I couldn’t remove all my usual urban colors, because I was going to
spend a couple of days in the Bay Area first. And they all had to fit within
the 23 available slots in my Tran Portfolio Pencil Case (two of the 25 slots are permanently assigned to a
white pencil and a cheap conventional brush). The
exercise required some critical sampling and making judicious choices.
Shown
above is my typical urban palette. (All colors are Caran d’Ache Museum Aquarelles except 217, which is Faber-Castell’s Albrecht Durer Middle
Cadmium Red. A brick red that I’ve been using frequently on the Tudors in my neighborhood, it is surprisingly lacking in the Museum palette.) This is basically the same palette
I’ve been using since February after my minimal sketch kit challenge ended. I finally took out the cherry blossom pink I
had optimistically carried for months. Just recently I’ve been carrying a neon
orange/neon green bicolored pencil, which is so useful in construction zones (probably less so in Yosemite, but who knows
about San Jose?).
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| My Yosemite palette |
I retained
all the above and added the carefully selected four shown at right – three earthy
tones that were missing from my urban palette, plus indigo, which I thought
might come in handy for rocky shadows.
I’ll
let you know in a few days whether my selection turned out to be useful! Or you
can see for yourself now on Instagram.
You will need all the greens for sure and mosquito repellent!
ReplyDeleteIf you're going there because of Ansel Adams photos, all you need is a Blackwing and white paper (grin). Hope you and Greg have a great time.
ReplyDeleteWish I had seen this post before I saw so many of your sketches from Yosemite. I would have been analyzing each painting to see what colors you used.
ReplyDelete