I’m picking up where George left off in his last post.
Danny Gregory, compulsive drawer and constant observer, compiled this book called “An Illustrated Life“, which found its way to my desk one day. It’s a book compiled by one sketchbook-er about other sketchbook-ers to other aspiring or actual sketchbook-ers. Gregory’s artists talk about their sketchbooks and sketchbook-keeping habits and tendencies, and show you selected pages of their books that you can drool and leave puddles over. It is a beautiful book, it is so …

I’ve noticed a few habits when I use sketchbooks. Some of them may be useful? Or funny. maybe.
1. When I sketch, I turn my book around a lot. So sketches are at multiple angles on a single page.
I noticed I do this a lot. Perhaps it’s because I don’t want the lines from the previous sketch to bias the current one. It also helps me to ‘free myself’ from the previous image. Also it allows me to use bits of …

There’s piles and piles of sketchbooks around me as I speak. Real physical sketchbooks (courtesy George and Smee, and me) and the sketchbooks I can remember my classmates made when we were all together back in art school, and of course online  sketchbooks of famous people we’d gawk at on the projector screen during class. I’ve come to understand very early on, that a sketchbook is a hopefully not gory peek into an artist’s head. The kind of things they like, what they observe, …

You’re the manic sort who sits in a corner of a cafe and viciously draws everything and everyone you see. You’re the crowd-puller in the park, as spectators sprout behind you, watching you work as you make a detailed study of a tree. You stop traffic in a crowded market street by setting up an easel, ready to capture life as we know it on a A4 sheet. Well! And you’re equipped with one or more of the following colouring materials to sketch away at the world outside exactly the …

I thought you, lover of pencil boxes and their collection of tools and other oddments, might enjoy this. I know I did!
An extract from A A Milne’s Christopher Robin Gives Pooh a Party.
“When Pooh saw what it was, he nearly fell down, he was so pleased. It was a Special Pencil Case. There were pencils in it marked “B” for Bear, and pencils marked “HB “ for Helping Bear, and pencils marked “BB” for Brave Bear. There was a knife for sharpening the pencils, …

Drawing is really darned scary for so many people. “I can’t draw.” “Did you draw that with your own hand?” (Yes, who else’s!) “Eeee… these are really bad drawings. Don’t look at them.” “I don’t draw because I don’t know how.” “I am a graphic designer so I don’t have to draw.” “My left toe hurts so I can’t draw.” The list of excuses is endless. So here’s some more demystifying tips for those happy folks who’ve got a sketchbook close at hand and a desire to draw in their …