Flying Chairs

I'm taking a drawing class and this was one of our assignments. "Draw a chair floating in the sky". The top one is my first sketch in my little sketchbook (the actual drawing is about 5"x8"). The bottom drawing is about 18"x24" and started as a charcoal pencil drawing but ended up in pastel. I just can't seem to do a drawing these days without color. I took a photo of the bottom drawing and the white edges and bottoms of the feet were actually dark graphite pencil over the pastel but because of the flashes reflection, they show up white. It's pretty cool this way. I think I like the photo better than the actual drawing. Isn't art fun?

Snow Bowl

Alex has been skiing a lot lately. We are so lucky to live in Camden where we are right on the ocean but also have a place to ski just 2 miles from our house. The lodge at the Snow Bowl is an A frame building with a wall of glass facing the ski slopes. These are the only windows in the building so it makes for a very dark interior and a very bright exterior which is what I was trying to capture in the top sketch. Today was he last day of skiing for the year.

Random sketches

The Flight Home

Krabi to Bangkok

OK, I don't know if anyone's noticed but I changed the heading on my blog. It was a lot of fun to make it. I used a couple of computer programs to do it - Sketchup for the 3D lettering, Xara for the image making and Artrage to put it all together. Alex and I did all the little doodles together which was a ton of fun. So if you like it, let us know!

Getting toward the end of the Thailand sketches - finally! It was a great trip and I hope you enjoyed the sketches...

Ko Hong Island, Thailand

Ao Nang Beach, Thailand

Cooling Off

Plane to Krabi

Kanchanaburi, Thailand

Buddha in the Roots

Chiang Mai to Ayutthaya

Back to Chiang Mai

Day Two of Trekking

I learned a lot from this sketch. Sometimes I get to thinking I can just whip out a sketch so I'll sit down and get going. In this case I started with the right side of the building and the roof overhang and started to build the sketch from there but I got the scale of the barrel wrong and then the building behind was way off and before I knew it I was drawing things that didn't exist. Looking at it now I can't really tell if it's "right" or "wrong" - it just looks like a sketch and if it were more like what it was, that's all it would be. In other words, it helped me lighten up.

Hilltribe Trekking

The first day of Trekking ended here in the small village of Balo on the side of a moutain (about 30 houses). This was our hut for the night. There were 18 of us on the floor of this hut which also served as our dining room and kitchen. I imagine that it served many functions for the village - town meeting hall, guest house, public square, community dining hall.

I sketched this before it got dark and then colored it in the morning before we left. The children in the village found us interesting and played in the open area in front of the hut. Bonnie handed out Canadian stickers, they played guns, train, and they also found my sketching interesting. Because it was my first time sketching in front of the group I was a bit self conscious but everyone really liked it I think. The first time sketching in front of others is the most difficult but then you become "that guy that sketches". Not such a bad way of being thought about...

PS- Brian posted the picture he took so I thought it would be fun to post his picture too.

Bangkok to Chiang Mai

Between the sketches on the first page and the second page we went biking through the streets and pedestrian sidewalks of Bangkok. This video shows what it was like.

Tokyo to Bangkok

Camden to Newark

I just returned recently from a trip to amazing Thailand and have lots of sketches to post. Rather than do one huge post, I think I'll post one a day or try to until they're all up. I signed up back in January to go on this trip with GAP Adventure Travel. The trip I went on is described in detail here on their website and, with some minor variations, we pretty much followed this itinerary. Airports are great places to sketch - lots of subject matter and wait time. The plane ride there involved three legs. Portland to Newark, Newark to Tokyo, and finally Tokyo to Bangkok. About 27 hours of travel time. I had to blur out some phone #'s and calling card codes to protect the innocent.