A Doodle A Day

Wood for the Trees

Well this week has seen me throwing up like a good un on Monday night in a hotel in Manchester, from what I am presuming was a dodgy Chilli on the lunchtime, watching the Incredibles twice on Tuesday night over room service in the same hotel. Home to repack on Wednesday and then last night was spent in my favorite of the hotels I tend to stay at, in Devon.

Last night was also apart from being lovely not to be in the center of a city also the first chance I had really had to doodle a bit. So I sat there on the evening on the patio out the back of the chalet style hotel room doodling the trees that form the edge of the hotel grounds and the beginning of the moors.

Only quick scribbles as it was raining on and off for most of the time although I did manage to use three different mediums.

Pen and Ink is a great medium for doodling as is the Studio pencil, but I must admit that apart from using watercolour in a kind of watercolour wash way with pen and ink I don't tend to get on very well with it as a medium and always find it frustrating and am never happy with the results.

I could try and blame the rotten watercolour on the fact it kept on showering with rain and had to keep on covering the watercolour pans and pad, but in truth I am just useless with the medium!

So as the rain set in the majority of the night, after insulting the chef by asking if I could have something to eat without all the fancy trimmings was spent reading Jingo by Pratchett.

And not that it is that interesting at all, but below is the doodle desk for last nights scribbles!

I did pop the mini disk Walkman on for a while last night because the bird song was gorgeous but on playing the disk back tonight I have found that I had the mic set to low sensitivity and the audio blog software seems to reduce the volume further on uploading so it's a no go for posting. So nil point there!

Another nil point is that this is the first week for quite some time and in fact since I started participating in Illustration Fridays weekly topics that I have missed doing a doodle on the weeks theme so I had best pull my finger out for the new topic for this week.

The Stats..

Doodle One, Dipping pen & Ink on 150 g/m Cartridge paper. Doodle Two, Studio Pencil on 150 g/m Cartridge Paper. Doodle Three, Artists Watercolour on 300 g/m Langton rough Watercolour Paper, No 8 Kolinsky Sable.

There's a new kid in town!

It's been a while since I've posted, mind it's been a while since I've been doodling. I've been split between delving deep into technical jargon and legalities and feeling a bit under the weather (sob sob).

However hopefully get back to some doodling this week. That's if world war three hasn't broken out as there is a new kid in town and I'm not sure that Smudge has noticed yet! He just about sits in the palm of your hand, is ginger and white, has green eyes the size of dinner plates and looks like trouble!

Of course as Grindle traveled home in the car today she who must not be named told me that I would turn Grindle into a character for the web site by tonight, I of course denied any such thoughts, so erm... hmmmm...

The Perfect Day

Illustration Friday's topic of the week is 'reinvent'

Tommy lay there, his back against his favourite tree, his eyes closed and wished that he could reinvent time.

There would be only one, long, perfect summers day, such as today was and nothing would ever change.

The sun would always shine in a perfect Wedgewood blue sky, the leaves would never fall. No one would grow older, no one would die and he would always believe in Smudge and Smudge in him.

Smudge thought, as he lay there pretending to be asleep in the long cool grass under the shade of the tree that he hoped that in this prefect world you would only have to wash and brush your teeth once and that the bakers would always be open with an unending supply of fresh, tasty Blueberry Muffins.

Now that would be the perfect day!

Technical pen and watercolour on watercolour paper.

The last of the Dodo's

Illustration Friday's topic of the week is Alone.

Everyone seems to be keen to get going this week as there are already over seventy illustrations entered! Anyway, on with the show and this is my quick doodle for this weeks topic.

 Al is a Dodo,
he is the last one.
All of the others are eaten and gone.

And that is why he is 'Al-one',
and has no friends to call on the phone.

I know, I know.....

Dipping Pen and brush and Ink on waterolour paper. 40 mins

The Desk

Tonight was one of those, I want to draw, I can't be bothered to draw, but I want to draw, but I can't be bothered, but I want ..... occasions and as I was having this internal argument with myself while listening to The Wind in The Willows on audio cassette, I unconsciously found myself sitting there doodling the items on the desk in front of me.

Dipping pen and ink as a sketching medium is interesting as it does not allow for errors as you can't correct apart from combining those incorrect lines in to the drawing somehow. I also make it harder for myself as I do not do a basic pencil rough which then is drawn over in more detail with the ink. It's straight in with the ink. However I also have the same ethos with pencil drawings as no lines or marks are erased, they are always combined into the drawing even if they are incorrect.

I have a couple of rules as far as drawing goes.

I never ever erase lines. Pencil erasers are banned.

I never do a drawing twice, it's first time or nothing.

Every drawing I do is posted onto here. Tonia had mentioned to me in conversation that she presumed I only posted drawings that I was happy with. Well No, every single drawing I do appears on here irrespective of how it comes out. But in truth there is never an excuse for a 'bad' drawing as it is simply a matter of thinking, looking, seeing and rendering, but drawings can always be improved upon.

Tracing paper is banned, everything has to be freehand. I always despair when I see artists using things like projectors to project images which they then paint over etc. What fun is that? May as well buy an Etch a Sketch or a paint by numbers book.

As far as watercolour is concerned no colours are ever mixed on the palette they are mixed on the paper by subsequent washes. The china wells are simply used to dilute and create quantity.

Anyway, there you go. I'm still not sure as to whether I won or lost the argument with myself though!

The Desk.

Dipping Pen and Ink on Cartridge Paper. 30 mins.

Room View

A quick pencil doodle tonight as I sit in the hotel room with Ray Mears in the background on the TV.

An interesting fact that I didn't know is that 'Safari' is Swahili for 'travel'. So in fact we are all on Safari!

I also learned something else tonight. Every time I stay at this hotel I drive along some narrow winding roads through some gorgeously thick dim green light tree lined stretches that in places dip away down into shady gullies and then open out into wide open vistas.

Every time I do the route I wonder where or what this area is and tonight I slowed down enough to catch a sign, and part of the area is Greenham Common. Now there is a blast from the past of many protests on the news.

Someone asked a while back what I use to do the doodles etc. Well, over at Tree of life I have posted a picture of my 'travel' kit, or rather my stay away kit. I have posted it over there as the whole idea of this site is every post has a sketch and only a sketch, no photographs.

Room View

Studio Pencil on Watercolour Paper. 30 mins.

Where shall we go today?

Something a little different, music and pictures!

Illustration Friday's topic of the week is Travel.

MP3 File

Of course there are many ways to travel; plane, car, boat, camel, pogo stick and of course, dreams. So a very quick doodle for this topic as I haven't got oodles of time today or indeed will have any more time during the week. Yes, it sees the return of the small brown bear and the idea of traveling in dreams was brought to me when chilling out earlier with my guitar and recording a simple little lullaby which I posted to Tree of Life, and then I though that would make a good subject for this weeks challenge. So a picture from me with accompaniment from me as well! Of course I can't actually let you see what he dreams of, so I've had to censor the picture! Well OK, I had to crop the image as I messed the dream bubble up! Hey ho, he was floating in space on a huge Blueberry muffin eating it, but it all went a bit Pete Tong (wrong)!

(Edit 03~04~05, probably this post from today Room View counts in this topic as well, as it's another hotel room in another town)

Where shall we go today?

Pen and Watercolour on Watercolour Paper. 15 mins

(and my arrangement of Lullaby by Creed)