Open Mic Again (and a White Daily-Carry!)

 

3/1/26 Open mic at Cocoa Legato, Greenwood neighborhood

Ching and I had so much fun at Cocoa Legato’s open mic session a couple of weeks ago that we went again, and this time Natalie came with us. Last time, attendance was a bit sparse, but word must have gotten out, because we could hardly find a table on Sunday. I’m happy that business has picked up for this unique chocolate and music venue.

I think I captured all the participating vocalists except the few who were onstage while I was scarfing down my avocado toast with chocolate nibs. (Yes, it was delicious! All their surprising entrees taste better than they initially seem like they would!)

Newsflash: For the first time in years, my daily-carry sketch journal contains white paper! How radical! As much as I love using colored Uglybooks for almost all types of sketching, around this time of year, I start missing the opportunity to use color when I’m out walking and spot a blossoming tree.

The first sketch in this book is dated 7/2/20, but all I had to
do was look at the sticker on the cover to know the era in which
I started it.

As happens, I was looking through some sketchbooks and came upon an old pocket-size, softcover Stillman & Birn Beta that I had started during the pandemic. After using the first half, I abandoned it, possibly because I had discovered Hahnemühle. Anyway, I seem to be on a mission to complete partially used sketchbooks, so it was a fortuitous find in my stash. If it works, it will enable me to use color spontaneously without having to carry an additional book (and therefore an additional tote).

It’s most likely a brief interlude; half of a 52-page book isn’t going to last me long as a daily sketch journal. It’ll be long enough, though, to decide whether I can tolerate its bulkiness as a daily-carry. I enjoy using colored pages too much to switch permanently, but maybe it would be a good change during the more colorful seasons.

For the record, it does bother me that I’ve broken the chronological continuity of my daily sketch journal process in Uglybooks, which I’d maintained for more than two years. How weird to proceed in the middle of a sketchbook half-filled with random sketches, especially from the worst of all years, 2020! After pondering for a while, though, I reminded myself not to be a slave to my own “rules.” It’s the daily practice that’s important, not the book I use.

Review: Tombow Urban Sketching Set

Tombow Urban Sketching Set

Around the time that I was looking for a portfolio that would become my “downstairs studio,” a kit assembled specifically for urban sketching was brought to my attention. I’m so used to putting together my own portable sketch kits that considering a readymade kit had never occurred to me, even when I was a newbie. (After all, at least part of the fun of urban sketching is continually assembling and reassembling one’s kit, right?) But since the more general kits had been on my mind, the Tombow Urban Sketching Set piqued my curiosity.

In the same way that I had questioned whether someone new to art would be able to happily use a readymade kit like the one I bought (for its portfolio), I asked: Would a beginning urban sketcher be able to take the Tombow kit out on location as is (nothing more) and have a fun sketching experience? Let’s see.

The Tombow Urban Sketching Set comes in a cute hinged tin illustrated with a design by Carla Kamphuis. Inside the tin are two ABT Dual Brush Pens in brown and dark blue; a red, double-sided ABT Pro alcohol-based marker; a Mono 100 graphite pencil (grade H); two Irojiten colored pencils in Verdigris and Almond Blossom; a waterproof Fudenosuke brush pen; a waterbrush with a flat tip; and a Mono eraser. (I admit, I already had the pencils, the eraser, the waterbrush, and one of the Dual Brush Pens, but it was somehow more fun to see the items put together in a box by someone else.) The products all fit nicely into a compartmentalized foam pad to keep them from rattling around. 

Kit contents nestled in a foam pad.

The set also includes a step-by-step guide book in several languages showing how to duplicate the tin illustration. All the set materials are used in the tutorial. The instructions include tips like applying the brush pen colors directly to the tin lid, then using the waterbrush to mix the colors.

Step-by-step tutorial in the guide

The guide begins with this introduction to urban sketching:

“Take your set outside and draw what you see! With Urban Sketching you draw on location and it can be done both indoors and outdoors. You draw the scene on the spot. Don’t have the time or inclination? Feel free to take a picture of your beautiful and inspiring environment so that you can (continue) to draw at home.”

[Editorial: Although that’s not a bad description of urban sketching, this part is a bit of a slippery slope: “Don’t have the time or inclination? Feel free to take a picture. . . so that you can (continue) to draw at home” – with “continue” in parentheses. But I’ll allow it.]

Using Blick and JetPens as my guides, I priced out the pieces if purchased individually (I had to estimate on Irojiten, which are hard to find open stock), and they come to more than $27. The set costs about $32, so it’s a good value, if you consider the cute tin and the how-to.

Unfortunately, that tin, which is 9” L x 4 ½” W x 1 ½” D, is ridiculous as an urban sketching kit container. All that added weight and bulk for nine tools! Why didn’t Tombow put those materials in a basic fabric roll like the bright yellow one that comes with its standard line of colored pencils? Or a case like the limited-edition case for Irojiten colored pencils? It might add a bit more to the total cost, but a roll would be lighter, thinner and much more practical for transporting and on-location sketching.

The bulky tin is 1 1/2" deep.

Since I was determined to test the kit as is, I took it out in my mobile studio. Placed on the passenger seat, the tin was usable. (It would also work at a café table, but it would still require hauling there; it doesn’t fit in any of my Rickshaw bags.)

Not something I would tote around, but the tin works in the mobile studio.

I didn’t consider the kit’s contents when I chose the location. I simply pulled over in the neighborhood – trees, houses, car, even some long afternoon shadows – my usual urban sketch scene. As soon as I opened the tin, I realized how unusual the palette and most of the materials were for me. The alcohol-based marker was entirely new to me. Although I had used Dual Brush Pens for urban sketching in the past, it had been a long time. I almost never use a graphite pencil unless it’s the only material I’m using, so that felt new to me, too.

2/2/23 Maple Leaf neighborhood sketched with everything in the Tombow Urban Sketching Set (Hahnemuhle sketchbook)

I began with the Mono 100 graphite pencil to block in the main elements and also to draw the foreground trees. The H grade is useful for blocking in, but too pale for drawing, so I went back over most of the branches with the Fudenosuke brush pen. I also used the brush pen on the brown house and car.

Next I used the blue Dual Brush Pen for the street shadows and the brown pen to color the house. The house turned out darker than I wanted, so I tried to dilute it a bit with the waterbrush. That was one reason I stopped using those markers – it’s difficult to moderate the color intensity.

I used the green Irojiten colored pencil for the trees and shrubs. I “licked” a bit of color from the blue brush pen with the waterbrush to apply a tint in some areas, and I was pleasantly surprised to see that the diluted ink has a violet hue.

I thought I was done, but then I looked in the tin and saw that I still had a couple of materials to use: the pink colored pencil and the red alcohol marker. With nowhere else to go, I used them on the car. The only thing I didn’t use at all was the eraser. Don’t get me wrong – I have nothing against erasers, and it doesn’t mean I never make a mark that I regret. I just didn’t have a use for it in this sketch.

Overall, the color choices are fine for most urban scenes. I’d hardly use the pink except during cherry blossom season. I didn’t take advantage of whatever properties make the alcohol-based marker different from the water-based Dual Brush Pens, so I’d like to explore that one further. It’s a good variety of products that would give a new urban sketcher a range of possibilities.

This is my bias, but I also think it’s cool that the kit contains no watercolors. Plenty of small, premade watercolor kits can be found on the market, and some are promoted specifically for urban sketching. It’s refreshing to see a kit with a focus on pencils and markers, which are probably friendlier to sketcher wannabes than paints might be.

The kit comes with the flat brush on the left.

Other than the tin, my only complaint is the choice of the waterbrush shape. Tombow makes a few different styles, and the so-called flat brush is the least useful (see my review). Obviously, you can’t do an actual wash with a waterbrush, so a standard round brush with a pointed tip would be the most versatile. I had to use a corner of the flat brush with mixed results.

My final comment is about where to buy this kit. I got mine at Cult Pens, a UK shop that I had become acquainted with back when I was trying to find a Caran d’Ache Prismalo Swiss Wood set. I have since made a few purchases there (especially when shipping was a lot lower than it is now), and they have good customer service. But surely this Tombow set must be available somewhere in the US, right? I looked, and so far, I haven’t found it anywhere but in Europe. I think it’s fairly new, though, so maybe it’s still making its way over here. 

Worried (Plus More Toned Paper Thoughts)

10/3/17 Maple Leaf neighborhood

If you’ve ever sketched at a work site of some kind, perhaps this has happened to you: You stand nearby, pull out your sketchbook, and start to sketch the excavator or other heavy equipment. One by one, the workers notice you. Eventually one comes over to find out what you’re doing. They may simply be curious, but often they seem concerned that you’re taking notes. A cranky neighbor poised to report the noise or dust? An inspector of some kind? When they see that all you’re doing is sketching, they are usually relieved.

Anyway, I missed most of the action. By the time I got there, they were packing up their tools and parking the excavator for the day. This is happening just a block from my house, so I’ll probably be back again later for more action. At least next time they won’t worry. 

Technical note: As much as I enjoy using toned paper for tonal drawings (like the value studies I did in Don Colley’s workshop), I don’t care for using color on it. My “heavy-equipment yellow” and “cone orange” colored pencils usually pop on white, but they seem dull and muddy here. I’m going to stick it out a while longer, but don’t be surprised if you see the return of white before I fill this book.

Sunshine and Peacocks at Chateau Ste. Michelle

9/22/17 Chateau Ste. Michelle

It’s been at least a couple of decades since I last drove east to the Chateau Ste. Michelle winery in Woodinville. The state’s oldest winery, it’s on a lovely wooded property, resident peacocks roam the grounds, and wherever you sniff, wine is in the air! As if all that weren’t enough, Urban Sketchers Seattle had blue skies and sunshine on a day that could have gone just as easily towards clouds and rain.

9/22/17 Claude, the peacock

Along with several other sketchers, I walked toward the vineyard, and none of us could resist nibbling the fat, purple grapes we plucked from the vines. I was braced for tartness, but the one I popped into my mouth was fully ripe and amazingly sweet – sweeter than any grapes we buy at the store. With that sweetness still lingering, I plunked my stool down at the side of the entrance road to sketch the rows of trees welcoming visitors.

Next I walked around the winery grounds looking for the resident peacock pair. They were both sitting on the manor house porch, preening lazily for nearly the whole time I sketched Claude. He stopped preening long enough to stand for a moment and look around, and I saw that he was limping, apparently from a run-in with a visitor’s car.

As is often my habit, I had about 15 minutes to kill before the throwdown. The chateau (which houses one of the tasting rooms) is a large building, so I bit off a piece small enough to chew in those remaining minutes.

Although Woodinville is a little further than we typically go for Friday outings, we had an excellent turnout of sketchers on a gorgeous autumn day.

9/22/17 Chateau building

Technical note: Looking out the window at the clear sky before I left for the outing, I almost grabbed my usual white paper signature; I just didn’t feel like using gray toned paper in the sunshine! But I know I won’t get acquainted with toned paper if I don’t stick it out for a while, so I resisted. It was challenging trying to capture the light without default white paper. In addition, even though I just got through saying I was planning to use only dry colored pencils in my Stillman & Birn Nova book because the paper isn’t intended for wet media, I couldn’t resist spraying those trees anyway. The paper held up better than I expected, but it still buckled a bit. 

I’ll have better luck with Nova paper when the weather goes gray (all too soon, I’m sure). When that happens, I’ll probably stick to black markers or graphite and white colored pencil or gel pen most of the time. I say that now, but I don’t have much of a reputation for sticking with my plans! We’ll see.

Funko Fun

9/16/17 Funko store at the corner of California Street and Wetmore Avenue

Last month the new Funko store opened in downtown Everett to much local fanfare. Pop culture toys are generally off my radar, so I didn’t even know about the store until I saw Gabi Campanario’s Seattle Sketcher column about the grand opening. But as soon as I saw his sketches, I knew I had to get up there sometime soon!

A half-hour north of Seattle, Everett is a hard-working town without much of what would be called “color,” so Funko has added a big bright spot to the town’s center. Pop culture icons like Chewbacca, Mickey Mouse, Batman and Harry Potter decorate the store’s awnings on two sides of the building. I had a lot to choose from, but today I focused on Freddy Funko, the store’s own mascot, high above the store’s entrance. Spider-man and Batman look down from the covered walkway between the store and the parking garage. 

Inside the store, it’s like a mini-Disneyland of giant Funko pop characters. So dazzled by the colorful décor, I almost forgot it was a store. I spent the most time in the Star Wars area, since those characters are the only pop culture icons I have any affinity for. The least expensive things I saw in the whole store were keychains for $5 and pens for $3. A cool Star Wars backpack I wanted was $70! I passed on that. 

Funko storefront

Me and Han (or is it Luke?)

Me and Chewie

Princess Leia Wobblers

Star Wars pens

I want this backpack! (But not for $70.)

This Stormtrooper clutch would make a great pencil case/sketch kit!

PARK(ing) Day in Maple Leaf

9/15/17 Pop-up park in the Maple Leaf neighborhood

Who knew that international PARK(ing) Day has been going on for a decade? It’s an annual event to “raise awareness about the importance of walkable, livable and healthy communities.” I first heard about it last year when Urban Sketchers Tacoma took part in it. Then earlier this week I was reading our neighborhood blog, Maple Leaf Life, and learned that a “pop-up park” would be installed today just a few blocks north of our house.

Greg and I walked up to Northeast 85^th Street this afternoon and found that a few parking spaces on Fifth Avenue Northeast had been cordoned off, and chairs and benches had been hospitably provided. A coffee urn, a cooler of beverages and snacks were offered to neighbors walking and biking by to see what was going on. The idea is to use a space normally reserved for cars as a place for people to gather. Aimee (in the green T-shirt), a leader of the Maple Leaf Greenways organization, spearheaded the pop-up park at that busy intersection. 

It was fun to meet a few people, exchange thoughts on neighborhood issues and discuss possible solutions. Heck, it was just fun to stand in the warm sunshine sketching the event on a beautiful Friday afternoon.

Sneaking in Sketches, Part 2: Newberg and Portland

8/22/17 Koi at Portland Japanese Garden

Yesterday I showed the sketches I did during my family reunion when everyone else was occupied elsewhere. Shown here are sketches I managed to sneak in even while being engaged in family activities.

In Portland where we spent most of our post-eclipse time together, I visited the Portland Japanese Garden (where I sketched a few years ago) and the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (where I also sketched a few years ago) with various family members. I grabbed the sketch of the koi at the garden while others were taking a nuclear family photo. 

It was even easier getting the sketch of the Gravitram at OMSI because we were all so entranced by it. I spent a good 15 minutes myself just watching the balls rolling around its crazy rollercoaster of tracks and levers. Then while the others were still mesmerized, I stepped aside for a quick sketch. (It’s all a matter of constantly being on the lookout for an opportunity, and when it appears, I simply pounce – and sketch fast.)

8/23/17 Gravitram at OMSI

In Newberg after the eclipse excitement was over, some of us visited a couple of Willamette wineries for tastings. My sketch at the Alit Winery (below) was no effort at all – the tasting room’s comfortable couch and livingroom-like ambiance made it easy to sit back and sketch while we all tasted (I enjoyed the Chardonnay so much that I bought a bottle to take home). 

Perhaps my favorite sketches from the Oregon trip (other than my very special eclipse series) were the series of small gestures of my family members playing Frisbee. I filled three sketchbook pages trying to capture two main gestures: the tossing motion and the catching motion. Each person had a slightly different style for each, yet the basic gestures were similar – the way one leg would lift when throwing and catching, or the stoop to pick up the Frisbee. It was fun to participate simply by observing as closely as possible. 

8/21/17 Alit Winery tasting

8/20/17 Frisbee players

Bonus Points: Couch

8/18/17 Maple Leaf neighborhood

As if it hadn’t been enough to sketch at one of my favorite parks with USk Seattle, I was walking home from that outing last Friday when I won bonus points: yet another urban couch, right there on Roosevelt Way. When it rains, it pours (but not that day – it was beautifully sunny! My wistfulness about summer ending was premature!).

Keeping Up

8/5/17 Maple Leaf neighborhood

The couches are appearing so often in my neighborhood that I can hardly keep up. The top one is probably the most ornate one I’ve sketched so far. Rather charming next to the yellow picket fence, don’t you think? 

The one below – let’s just say it lacked charm, though it was appropriately placed next to the trash bins on trash day. On the driveway behind the easy chair were more overflowing trash and recycle bins. The “free” signs were written on torn-off notebook paper and scrawled in pencil.

8/7/17 Wedgwood neighborhood

Sun and Rain in the Twin Cities

8/2/17 Centennial Lakes Park

8/2/17 Parking lot of the Bloomington Country Inn & Suites

From Chicago we took a short flight to Minneapolis to visit with family for a couple of days. While we had consistently beautiful sunshine in Chicago, Minneapolis was a mix. Knowing rain would come the second day, we spent our first day outdoors as much as possible. I got an early start while Greg was still in the shower by sketching the heavy equipment in our hotel’s parking lot, where major remodeling was taking place.

Centennial Lakes is one of our favorite Minneapolis parks (top of page). I knew I had sketched there on a previous trip, so I searched through my blog and found the post – it was in 2013. Interestingly, I had sketched both of the same subjects then as I sketched this year – the arched bridge across the lake and a white heron (possibly the same heron?).

8/2/17 Heron at Centennial Lakes Park

The same day we had a late lunch at W.S. Frost (below), an excellent and popular restaurant with a lovely terrace. With a long wait for a table, I had plenty of time to sketch the diners under umbrellas.

8/2/17 Waiting for our table at W.S. Frost

In the afternoon we went to St. Paul, where we discovered a pocket park called Summit Overlook. A large sculpture of an eagle and its young – apparently a relic of the New York Life Insurance Company – was the park’s centerpiece.

8/2/17 Sculpture at Summit Overlook

8/3/17 Country Inn & Suites lobby

The next day was cold and rainy, so I had to resort to the hotel lobby for my early-morning sketch. Later we shopped at Ax-Man Surplus, a store that has been around since Greg’s youth. Filled with oddities (mostly for display only, not for sale, like a weird museum) and quirky merchandise, Ax-Man is hard to describe or categorize. I can’t begin to name all the strange things we saw, but the unfortunate plastic fellow hanging from the ceiling was the least of them. It would be a fantastic place for a surreptitious sketch outing (I was discreet and quick, so no one saw me).

8/3/17 Strange sighting at Ax-Man

We also sheltered from the weather by touring a grand old mansion. I had an unusual sketch-related experience there that I’ll relate in a future post.

Chicago Symposium, Part 2: Art & Artifacts

7/28/17 Sue, the T-Rex, at the Field Museum

From what I knew of Chicago (I had visited a couple of decades ago and studied Internet photos the past year in preparation for the symposium), I figured architecture would be the dominant subject matter of my sketches, and yesterday’s post certainly indicates that. What I didn’t expect was the amazing richness in public art seen on Chicago streets and in parks. I sketched so much of it, in fact, that it warranted its own blog post here. 

Although I didn’t get around to the Art Institute, which I regret (there’s never enough time for everything I want to do), I did make a trip to the Field Museum of natural history, where I knew Lapin was teaching his workshop. Although I didn’t eavesdrop on his instructions (I didn’t want to look like I was trying to sneak into his workshop!), I voyeuristically included him and a few of his students in my sketch of Sue, the largest and most complete T-Rex skeleton in the world.

7/26/17 Anish Kapoor's Cloud Gate (affectionately known as "the Bean") at Millenium Park

7/26/17 One of a pair of lions guarding the entrance of the Art Institute.

7/27/17 Calder's Flamingo

7/27/17 Crown Fountain at Millenium Park

Seward Johnson's sculpture "Return Visit" in Pioneer Center

Calder's "Flying Dragon" outside the Art Institute

7/29/17 General Logan's memorial at Grant's Park

7/27/17 "The Bowman" on Congress Parkway

7/28/17 Pterandodon longiceps model at the Field Museum

Calder's Flamingo

Mandatory selfie at the Bean!

Selfie with Sue

Sketching the skyline reflected in the Bean