Here is an illustration I did last week for a friend’s thesis. She is studying the population dynamics of Grey Faced Petrels (Pterodoma macroptera). Grey faced petrels are a NZ native and are classified as not-threatened. However like most seabirds in NZ, they are at risk of predation by mammalian predators in their onshore nesting grounds.
The illustration shows a parent and chick, and is quite large (42 x 30cm). Completed in graphite pencil and black watercolour. I’m quite enjoying the monochrome palette at the moment!
If you are interested in learning more about these cool little birds, check out NZ Birds Online.
I’ve been playing around with ink and brush lately- having been totally inspired by Yuko Shimizu’s illustration and her new class on Skillshare– which is just amazing. Here are a series of photos from very random squiggle that I made into a face, all the way through several iterations to a final illustration that I’m pretty happy with. Re-doing drawings until I’m happy with them is something that has only just recently occurred to me (!!!). Its very rare that I’ll be able to make something that nice first time round, so instead of just being annoyed about the first go, hopefully with practice (ie what I have done here)- I’ll get better!
Anyway- here are the various versions:
1. Random Doodle:
Not sure where it came from, just randomly came into my head after squiggling that line that makes up the profile of his head.
2. the illustration I was pretty happy with but then decided it would be cool to add some extra bits to
I wasn’t happy with the little bird sitting on the guys head- so decided to change it to a big toucan (its in the Amazonian rainforest if you couldn’t tell) sitting on a branch above his head. Also wanted to improve the background a little.
3. The one where I had this idea to also add in little eyes in the dark areas of the foliage
That wasn’t a good idea….
4. The final (ish) illustration
Of course I’m sure there are still improvements that could be made! But I’m pretty happy with it. Its the most fun as well as the least planned drawing I’ve done in a long time, so that was pretty cool. All done with India Ink and a Chinese calligraphy brush.
You may have noticed but the posting has been a bit irregular over the last couple of weeks. I will be back to more regular posting soon- I’ve been working on a few real scientific illustrations!!- and should be able to share more on the site then.
Until then I’d love to know- Do you have anything new you have learnt recently that has made drawing more fun for you?
Its been rather quiet over here over the last couple of weeks- been feeling a bit unmotivated to make anything- especially since my scientific illustration course finished- so haven’t been posting. BUT I finally got the idea to do this little illustration of a Maui’s dolphin, and actually managed to FINISH it, which happens rarely. I actually did it twice- the first time the watercolour paper (Hahnmuhle watercolour 300gsm) I was using crapped out (won’t be using that again for watercolour!), and so I decided to re do it, second time without a background (and on my so-far-favourite- HP Fabriano 5 watercolour paper). There definitely is a benefit to doing a drawing twice!
PROCESS pics:
The background was going well…Until….
Round 2 attempt:
Can you spot the little kitten helping?
And the final scan:
Maui’s dolphin and her calf, watercolour, 2014
I was inspired to do this painting because World Ocean Day (on June 8th) and the campaign that WWF NZ is running, called the Last 55. It is estimated that there are only 55 Maui’s dolphins over the age of 1 year left- making them the rarest dolphin in the world (they are also the smallest dolphin in the world!). They are a sub species of the Hectors dolphin, which is found mostly in the South Island of NZ- however the Mauis dolphin (Cephalorhynchus hectori maui) is found on the west coast of the North Island (hence ‘Maui’s’, as te- Ika-a-Maui is the Maori name of the North Island)- they are NZ’s only endemic cetaceans. As they prefer shallow water, they are threatened by the fishing industry (set-net fishing and trawling), as well as ghost nets and other rubbish, and (to a lesser extent) diseases such as toxoplasmosis (which it is believed enters waterways via storm water runoff).
You can sign the WWF petition to help save the Mauis dolphin here (they are aiming to hit 55,000 signatures before the national elections at the end of this year), and if you have seen a Maui’s dolphin- report your sightings here to add to the national record. If you are interested in reading more- here is a recent article in the NZ Herald and some info from the excellent charity Project Jonah.
I’m thinking of selling some prints or cards of this illustration to with proceeds to go to one of the whale charities- would anyone be interested??
I hope you have a lovely weekend planned ahead. Here are some things I’m enjoying right now- maybe you will too!
Loving this awesome auction I won through Trademe (NZ version of ebay)- second hand technical + fountain pens galore! I can see a weekend of pen cleaning coming up! Luckily they all seem to have been looked after pretty well- they will be so useful for scientific illustration work.
inlcuding rotring isographs, staedtler marsmatic and osmiroid fountain pens!!!
Will post more about these guys once they are all cleaned up 🙂
On more of a fountain pen note- this advertisement by Pilot pens, illustrated by Shohei Otomo using a Namiki fountain pen. Check it out- its inspiring to watch the amazing artwork he creates (click on the link above to see more info about the artist). Fountain pens=awesome enviro-friendly sketch tools.
This Q+A with NZ author (Raymond Huber) and illustrator (Brian Lovelock) of Flight of the Honeybee– a childrens’ non fiction picture book about honeybees and how they find their food. The book has been nominated for the 2014 NZ Post Childrens Book awards. Amazing watercolour+acrylic illustrations- check out Brian Lovelocks’ other books- The Rain Train, Demolition and Roadworks for some amazing watercolour work. This interview is an interesting read for anyone wanting to get into writing or illustrating picture books.
Source: Auckland City Libraries
If you love to sketch nature subjects- have you seen the Sketching in Nature group blog? People submit sketches of animals, plants etc, and they are regularly updated on this site. A fun one to browse through.
I’ve been practising with watercolour a bit more over the last month or so- and so, I thought I would use that as an excuse to buy something I’ve had my eye on in the art shop for a while- a water brush. You’ve probably already heard of these wonderful contraptions, but if not, a quick refresher: Water brushes are synthetic brushes which have a hollow handle that you fill with water. The water is then dispensed through the brush by squeezing the handle, so you can control how wet the brush tip gets. As the packaging says- ‘its lightweight design permits portability and eliminates the need to carry water bottles’ – which is why they are very popular for urban/nature sketching. I have also seen them recommended in some watercolour books as a good tool for doing large areas of wash, though you probably want the largest size brush tip for that purpose.
source: Kuretake
I bought a ZIG BrusH2O (cost: $15 NZD), which is the most common brand in New Zealand, and is made by the japanese pen company, Kuretake. It’s available in four brush tip sizes, and I got the medium. I was initially going to get the detailer but then read a review that said the larger brush tip sizes have a great tip to do fine work with, so decided to go for the medium instead, so it would have more variation in line sizes.
So, I have had a week or two to play with this cool little contraption, and have discovered a few things…
PROS:
– Quite good variation between the thin and thick lines (and washes) are possible with the medium brush tip! So far the point on the brush has lasted really well too. Its really easy to get accurate lines with as well as quickly fill in areas of colour. I found the brush size to be similar to a No.4 brush.
– Its really good for a beginner like me- you can do graduated washes SO easily, as the water can be constantly wetting the brush tip, you don’t have to stop and pick up more water and then continue, which for the novice watercolour-ist can result in a bit of a break in flow of the colour, if too much clear water is then added, or the initial watercolour has already started drying.
Notice the difference in amount of water that is added with the waterbrush: the Winsor and Newton (regular) brush runs out of water near the end of the squiggly stroke (and is slightly more saturated), whereas the waterbrush just keeps going (sometimes adding a bit too much water in places!).
– Good for getting saturated bright colours on the paper BUT you need to make sure you mix the colours on the paper. If you mix them in a palette, you will end up with much paler colours because water is added regularly, thinning out the mixed colour. This also makes the waterbrush really good for thin coloured washes over larger areas.
– Very practical to use with tiny portable watercolour palettes (even my smallest one which has watercolour pans of about 1cm diameter). I thought it might be too big, but it works perfectly, probably because of the great brush tip point.
CONS:
– Controlling the amount of water coming through the tip can be difficult, and you can see in the washes below where too much water was added with the waterbrush. However if you are using the brush for work that is a bit looser, or ideally for sketchbooks, then its no big deal and can give some nice effects. I also think the water flow through the brush just takes some time and practice to get used to. Once you’ve got used to it, in some ways (see above) its actually easier to use than a regular brush; I’m already getting lazy and using it at home all the time!
You can see that the waterbrush adds a lot more water than I typically add with a regular brush- it takes a little time to learn to control this water flow to get the intended result. (Don’t mind the big drop of water I accidentally spilt on the graded wash!!)
– I found it really hard to fill the handle up with a decent amount of water, using the method suggested of immersing the unscrewed end of the handle into a cup of water and squeezing it to pull in water. I only got maybe 1/2 a tsp in the handle by doing this. If you were going to take this out sketching with you, you’d definitely want more water in there. So maybe I’ll get hold of a syringe and try filling it that way. Of course, I could also be doing it the wrong way- any tips please let me know!
How to use BrusH2O! source: kuretake
– The brush tip does discolour (with some paints) when you use it, even after you have cleaned the tip after use, because it is a white taklon brush tip. However this is purely cosmetic and hasn’t affected the use of the brush as far as I am aware.
Overall- I’ve found it to be an awesome tool, and I can’t wait to take it out ‘into the wild’ and try out some sketching with it (once I’ve figured out how to fill it up with some more water of course). This is also a pretty flexible tool with a number of uses besides the obvious. I have seen suggestions that you can fill the barrel up with a diluted black ink to use as grey washes with black ink sketches which sounds like something I’ll have to try soon! I believe some comic artists also use them filled with ink for brush line work, instead of other ink brush pens (such as Pentel Brush Pen and the Kuretake Brush Pen). I would recommend this handy brush, especially if you want to get into more urban/outdoor watercolour sketching.
Here are some interesting links if you’d like to learn more about waterbrushes:
If you want to see examples of the different brands and particularly sizes of brushes, check out this video by Cathy Johnson (skip to about 7.10 to see the beginning of the demos).
Also- if want to try something different, try out this tutorial on making a water brush from commercial kids paint brushes! I have read that the inventor of the waterbrush did in fact make his from an emptied out ink filled brush pen- so its not such a bad idea to try out. Sadly I couldn’t find these in shops here to try this out.
have fun if you do decide to get one!
emma
Please note that all reviews are entirely my own opinion- I haven’t received any compensation from the product companies that have been featured, and all products reviewed are paid for by me. Because I can’t help buying more art materials than I really need and the blog is a good excuse!!
Here is the first of my spot illustrations for the puriri moth poster I’m working on. Its done in watercolour with coloured pencil on top, and is four times life size. In real life the eggs measure roughly 2mm in diameter, and change from white to purpley black a couple of days after being laid.
leaf litter close up, watercolour and coloured pencil, 2014
The leaf litter itself is based off puriri tree leaf litter, so you have puriri leaves, and a decomposing berry (plus a green berry stalk) in the image. I found the soil very hard to depict!
And with the eggs:
leaf litter with puriri moth eggs, watercolour and coloured pencil, 2014
The eggs and the leaf litter study were done separately, so I still have a bit of work to do in photoshop on the composite image to make the eggs look more like they are “in” the image, rather than floating on top. Argh! Next time I will definitely be doing them as one.
In other news- this is the 50th post on this little blog! Thanks to all the people who are now following along! I’m hoping to develop my posts more to bring more tutorials and reviews in the coming months. Its been a learning curve this blogging thing, but a lot of fun, so thanks for your support so far.
As I’m trying to get more into watercolour painting (especially for the background of my poster)- I thought I would make up some colour palettes last night, following the wonderful exercises in Natural History Painting and Exotic Botanical Illustration– both by Meriel Thurstan and Rosie Martin. These colour mixing exercises are all based off a limited palette of one each cold and warm of all three primary colours. Its quite a useful exercise to do as it reveals the huge array of colours that can be made from just 6 tube colours. Besides that- don’t they just look pretty!?
I use Winsor and Newton Cotman watercolours and the 6 basic colours I used were: Lemon Yellow Hue (W&N 346), Cadmium Yellow Light Hue (W&N 119), Ultramarine Blue (W&N 660)/ Cobalt Blue Hue (W&N 179), Pthalo Blue Hue (W&N 327), Alizarin Crimson (W&N 003) and Cadmium Red Hue (W&N 095). I have to say after doing this exercise though- that neither of the blues I used were really very cool (Prussian Blue would have been better), and the warm yellow could have been warmer! But that’s just what I had at the time- so this colour mixing exercise has really been quite valuable in bringing that to light.
Colour mixing exercises, gradients from each of the primary colours, and a diluted version below each strip. Yellows and Reds, and Yellows and Blues
Colour mixing exercises, gradients from each of the primary colours, and a diluted version below each strip. Yellows and Blues continued and Reds and Blues
I also did the complementary colour chart- where you mix the first colour (equal parts of two of the primaries) and then do a gradient mixing to the third primary.
Complementary colour mixing! Each of three primary colours is mixed to form shades of brown and greyComplementary colour mixing! Plus, a few colour mixes with some extra tubes I had on hand (Raw Umber, Burnt Sienna and Permanent Rose).
The last few rows are colour mixes with some other premixed tubes of I had on hand (Burnt Sienna, Raw Umber and Permanent Rose). Mixing the Burnt sienna with Alizarin crimson got exactly the bright shade of red colour that I had always wondered how to get!
If you are interested, I found this useful guide on the W&N website, which lists the best colours from all their paint ranges, for the three primary system and for the 6-colour system. They also have practical tips for colour mixing, which is worth a read. Here is also a really useful resource from Golden Artist Colors. SO many things to learn about colour!
Does anyone have any good examples of watercolour painting technique books? I’d love to know!
So- in my last post, I mentioned that I would post the finished coloured pencil rendering of my puriri moth life cycle- so as promised- here it is, including all the individual illustrations!
All illustrations in coloured pencil (prismacolour and FC polychromos) and then lifecycle compiled digitally in photoshop 🙂
Puriri Moth eggs and litter phase larvaPuriri Moth transfer larva and tree phase larvaPuriri Moth Pupae (like a chrysalis)Adult male Puriri MothAdult female Puriri MothLife cycle of the Puriri Moth.
Man did that thing take a long time to do!
The next stage is to create background images for the poster I want to make! Probably watercolour and coloured pencil renderings…
And some weekend reading for you….
This fantastic article – ‘Why botanical illustration still matters in the digital age’ by Susanna Speier. A very interesting topic- its not unusual for people to ask WHY draw something when you can just take a photo of it- this essay gives some interesting points to consider.
Now- I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this illustrator before, but Dave Gunson is one of my favourite natural history illustrators of all time! If you are looking for inspiration- check out his website here, and also this fantastic interview by Kathy Temean’s blog for writing and illustrating for children. He also has a book about his wildlife art; Dave Gunsons’ New Zealand Wildlife <– check it out if you can!
Over the last few weeks I have been busily working away on my final project for my scientific illustration class (which is finishing shortly*sadface*)- hence my lack of posts over the last week! For my project, I decided to do an illustrated life cycle of the native puriri moth (Aenetus virescens) or Pepetuna. The puriri moth is the largest flying insect in NZ (females up to 150mm wingspan) and is beautifully coloured in varying shades of green (from yellow through blue). It is also long-lived (est. 5-7 years) but most people only encounter them in their adult form, when they live for only a couple of days!
Puriri moth, just emerged from pupae. Image copyright Nga Manu Images
check out this video footage of the puriri moth emerging from its pupa- the first time its been captured on film!
I wanted to do an illustrated life cycle to raise more awareness about their life history- which is not commonly known (they are nocturnal wood borers). Part of this process was finding specimens of the various life stages to illustrate from- and I can tell you this was no easy task! For the last few weeks any spare moment has been spent rooting around on forest floors and peering into tree trunk holes to try and find the larval forms of the moth- with varying levels of success. I have also had a lot of help from the Auckland Museum and other moth experts.
So, here are some photos and sketches of what I’ve been working on for the past couple of weeks:
museum specimen for reference- adult male mothpuriri moth habitat- the puriri tree!found this leftover pupae hanging out of an abandoned burrow!yes they do
Back to sketching at home…
outline sketch of male mothoutline sketch of the tree phase larva- they are huge!!tree phase and litter phase pencil drawings in progressmore refined pencil drawing of litter larva and pupaepencil drawing of adult female moth
The final illustration is going to be done in coloured pencil on strathmore windpower smooth paper (new coloured pencil fave!), and is compiled digitally in photoshop- I’ll share the final illustrations in my next post!
I hope you had a wonderful Easter weekend. Lucky for me my work was closed one extra day because of water repairs, SO I had a full 4 days off- yay! Thought I’d do a bit of a mishmash post today…
We had a big storm on Thursday, which led to power cuts for the rest of that day, and then Friday as well. I worked on an illustration for IF challenge– and this was the FIRST ONE I managed to actually finish and submit! Maybe that power cut gave extra productivity?
Most of my weekend was spent doing lots of little drawings of caterpillars and moths for my final project (sadface) for scientific illustration class.
lots and lots of moths and caterpillars…
Lots and lots of caterpillarrrs
I also made a sketchbook with sugar paper (aka construction paper) after being inspired by some of the wonderful mid toned sketchbook youtube videos by will terrell.
Did you know that sugar paper is named so because it used to be the paper used to make sugar bags back in the day? It is actually quite a nice paper to draw on too, and very cheap! I made my entire sketchbook for less than $2 (NZD). This is quite good because it means it doesn’t matter as much if I ruin it, haha. The other benefit of making your own sketchbooks are they are fully customisable, so I chose a shape that I liked, paper I liked and a binding that would allow the book to lay fully open= sketchbook of my dreams. Now I just have to use it…
my lovely blue painted sketchbook 🙂
Its the second hand bound sketchbook I’ve made and I’m pretty happy with it so far. Next time I might make the covers a bit thicker though- I just used some left over mount board this time.
inside cover patterned with prismacolours- sketches of lily
If you are interested in making a sketchbook, check out this link to Dani Draws site- she has a great tutorial!
some sketches of charlie
Easter Sunday was started off by going bush with the doggie- where she discovered the delights of a couple of beautiful fantails who flew very close to around us, cheerily chirping (as they often will do) and was very interested in said dog.
can you spot the little fantail?
I also managed to replant and rearrange some of my indoor succulent/fern garden, which were looking a bit sad- one or two had even perished over the first couple of months I had them. I’m sorry but HOW can you kill a succulent? Maybe its low water, not no water? I forget. Anyway, I also got a new-to-me second-hand bowl for one of the little guys from the local op shop. Love that place!
emma scheltema illustration 