Hitchin

One of several ipad sketches made in Hitchin today.

Poppies

The garden has settled down after all the upheaval and landscaping earlier in the year. Many of the flowers are now in full bloom. With a rare warm evening today I actually sat outside to draw one of the many poppies that I have left to flower rather than remove them as weeds.

Coca-cola

For me, drawing has to be fun. If I manage to draw a picture that makes me smile then I feel it is a success. The portrait here may not be an exact representation of the subject, but something made me work very quickly and play with various brushes on the ipad. I may not always be able to comment on what pictures I post because sometimes things appear that may just be inspired by a line, a scribble or a fleeting glimpse of a foot, nose, gesture or pose.

Lunchtime

Businessman having lunch.

Sketches

Some recent iPad sketches.

EU Referendum

Ask a group of people a question about which there is no clear answer and I am sure the result would be a 50:50 split either way. Which is what we have. They might just as well have asked all those who work in my office which seemed fairly split down the middle. If people are complaining about bias toward certain groups of people voting particular ways then that is what you will get with a simple yes or no vote in a democracy.

Canal Dreams

A friend wants to go and live on a narrow boat...

Toasted Sandwich

Letchworth sketching trip

Had some time to spare around Letchworth yesterday so did a bit of scribbling in various places.

Robin

A robin seemed to ne following me around the garden today. It was often perched on a fence or nearby tree and would dart down to the ground every so often to presumably catch a little snack. This isn't supposed to be me bytheway. It was the hottest day of the year so far today and a coat would certainly not have been appropriate in the heat. Took three car loads of rubble to the dump, built a small stick wigwam for sweetpeas, moved the swing, fine tuned the placement of a few plants and watered all the new plants.

Blue Dress

Man on train

A day trip to Brighton could have been a good opportunity to do some sketching but I didn't do much. The sun was too bright to use the iPad and it wasn't until the end of the day that I found a place in which I would have felt comfortable. Enjoyed time looking in shops and walking along the beach instead. Managed a few sketches in the train but they were not really of value to show, except this one.

Cupcake dilemma

Onion

One of our few remaining onions from last year's harvest. New sets were planted last weekend.

Robin

Wheelbarrow, Clun

I have been struggling with this picture for several weeks. I have sat down at several lunchtimes and tried to get this going but have either been distracted by other things or just not quite known what to do with it. The scene was taken from a photo I took in the village of Clun in Shropshire a few weeks ago. In the end I just sat down and filled in a few basic lines and decided to leave it at that. I don't like leaving things unfinished and now I feel I can move on to something else.

Selfie

This is me having walked up an incredibly steep hillside from Obley up onto Black Hill recently. It was windy, cold and wet! This is one of my favourite parts of the countryside around Clun.

Disc Harrow

I found this old MF26 disc harrow just inside a gateway on a hill near Clun a couple of weeks ago. I think it had been there for a few years or so but it wasn't overgrown with brambles. I'm not sure if a small harrow like this with a width of only about 6 ft would be economical to use these days. It may well have been used within the cultivated field in which I found it or it may have just been dumped here having been used for some other purpose - such as blocking the gateway (as old heavy equipment is often used for). I liked the red paint that was still quite vibrant amidst the rusty browns and wanted to experiment with finding an interesting composition within its structure that I would enjoy painting.

Sowdley Wood, Clunton

This JCB had been working all day recently up on the hill below Clunton in south Shropshire.  When the driver had gone home I took a couple of photos of the machine and then later worked them up into this sketch. All that I am basically doing is working over a photo on the iPad which is a technique I enjoy. It does produce an almost photo realistic image even though the paintwork is quite basic. It has enabled me to more quickly develop a style of working that I can apply to other images I use in my day job where I am having to create Christmas themed illustrations from scratch.

The JCB had been tidying up the left over branches and wood left after a mecahnical tree felling machine had cleared the former conifer plantation of timber. All the loose material was being piled up into large windrows across the hillside in between which new saplings could be planted on the cleared ground. The remaining tree stumps are left in the ground to rot away naturally.

Bookshop

Someone reading in a Hay-on-Wye bookshop.