Painted shells

Painted beach things…woo!

Drizzle Beach

Monifieth beach as the rain clouds rolled in (added to the watery splush I had going on the paper). Jemma sitting on a fine bit of driftwood too!

My first digital speed paint

I had to have a go at this as I’ve seen some great stuff online and was just waiting for the right moment. The benefit is you can use the colour correction and other tools at the end if you want to refine it slightly, although keeping it close to the initial idea is important (for me at least).

This was something I saw whilst driving the other day and told myself to remember. As the days have slipped by more details have leaked out into the ether. Now we’re just left with the original key points that made me take note of it in the first place.

Pittenweem arts festival

When I first moved up here I survived a few weeks before contracting the Scottish ‘lurgie’ to a degree not dissimilar to sufferers of the national disease, circa 1665 (drama queen I know). When I was on the road to recovery, I visited the Pittenweem Arts Festival on a gloriously sunny weekend and it was pretty impressive.

Lots of fantastic artists and a top location. I had time during the rather windy afternoon to do a quick watercolour sketch from the harbour.

Traditional painting!

I’ve been here in Dundee for a few months now, the feature project keeping me quite busy and rather spent by the end of the day! Scotland definitely lets you know winter is just around the corner, but there’s been some fantastic sunsets recently. I’m reading a book by Alwyn Crawshaw on watercolour (he loves it so!) and so have been having a go at watercolours. Here’s one where I got the colours close, although my colour mixing is in need of further practice! Lots of cartoon sketches and a backlog of life studies are scattered around sketchbooks, so I’ll aim to get a few bits up in the coming months. P.S, if you go to Scotland, aim for the Cairngorms and the mountain railway…the cafe at the top has the best view on this isle!