Inspired by her timeless beauty, I set out to sketch a little bit of the habitat under my oak tree.
Nitro, always compelled to get on the middle of everything, placed himself in the composition. Well, he is kind of cute. What's the worst that could happen?
Of course.
Since there are no mistakes in art, I decided to persevere and make do.
I haven’t painted much in awhile, so I was just happy to be out there playing around. I used watercolor pencils, one of my favorite quick sketch mediums. I sketch lightly and gradually add more colors in a scumbling manner. Scumbling is kind of like controlled scribbling. You lightly make little squiggles and circles in no particular direction except specifically not the same direction. This is a great shading technique for watercolor pencils, because you won’t have harsh pencil lines.
After you are done adding color, you can dip a small paintbrush in water and paint your pencil marks and move the pigment around. You need very little water. This part is fun. It reminds me of those paint coloring books with the little dots of color.
My biggest problems are not adding enough pigment and then being impatient and trying to add color pencil on damp paper. That never goes well.