POCKET SKETCHING with Kath Macaulay

#201 Virtual Travel
Because you can’t always go somewhere, why not relive the best places? Using a photo from your travel, isolate focal points and sketch only one. Always use the timer to stay within 25 minutes. (Architecture takes an extra 5 minutes.) As your mind can visualize only one thing at a time, you will escape into the trip. When you review your sketch, you will remember far more than is in the photo. This is a fabulous meditation.

#202 Travel Journaling
Always keep equipment at a minimum so you have portability and will sketch. If you bring too much ‘stuff’, you’ll never get it out. No scissors, tape, stencils, etc. A cheap calligraphy pen and your regular pen will allow you to embellish with squiggles, margins, always leaving space for words in the sketch. The sketch can be small, saving time. Embellish later.

#203 Focal Point
Too much ‘stuff’ will wreak anything and take too much time. Find what caught your eye. Stay within 25 minutes. The sketch will remind you of everything you didn’t sketch right down to the smells.

#204 Copying From A Magazine
Find a photo of a painting or sketch you like. There is a reason you like it, usually subliminal. Copy it in 25 minutes or less. In the process you will find out why you picked it and how it was made. You will incorporate this in your own work in the future.

#205 Scraping
Using an area already wet with water, scrape with any tool to clear an area. We used a credit card to clear rocks in a stream, then the end of the pen lid to scrape out bushes and trees. Thumb nails work well as scrapers.

#206 Wax As A Resist
John Singer Sargent, and others in the 1800s used a candle stub for wax as a resist. It is perfect for wind on water, bright reflections, and trees against the sky. Can be done in layers, holding each color as you build layers. It is never messy and is archival so you don’t remove it.

#207 Flowers and the Timer
Always start with a daisy: it’s the easiest flower. If you get it right, the viewer will think everything’s good. Everything else is out of focus and simply color, even the vase. It’s decorative, fun and the opposite of scientific illustration. Relax, enjoy. These look great when matted decoratively. Complete in 25 minutes or less, using a timer. Use everything you have learned: color, contrast, focal point, wax and scraping.

#208 Cobbled Still Life
Apples in a bowl are boring. In a room pick 3 or 4 items which are not together. Go to them and block them in on your paper, one in front of the other. You are building a composition of things from different places. Go back to each to finish the sketch. Use 5 extra minutes to find your items. Now you can take things out of context in a landscape.

#209 Field Equipment
When you really want portability, keep everything compact instead of big, thick sketchbooks that are hard bound. You want to see it, sketch it and leave within 25 minutes or less. You do not want to attract other people who will distract you. Plan to never put anything down on a table or easel where you will attract people or lose equipment.

#210 Fix ‘Em
When you don’t feel like starting anything, grab 4 or 5 poor sketches and try to fix them. Use contrast, color, focal point. Great review: two may get better, while 3 get worse, but they weren’t good anyway. Great review of the importance of the basics.

#211 Journaling
The difference is words. The addition of words doubles the meaning. Date the entry. Leave space for words that tell what’s important. Can be extremely personal and a private journal just for you. Can be a shared travel journal. Greeting cards as a travel journal. Also, how to pick a paper that will work with the pen.

#212 Food
No timer needed. You’ve paid for it, you’re hungry and it’s getting cold. Start with a mark and possibly include any background. It’s ephemeral, fast and fun. A bit about drinking and sketching.

#213 The Monotone
For extreme speed, go with just grey scale or use color for only the focal point. Convert a colored photo. No expensive equipment is needed: just “miles on the brush”. Your pen will allow the grey scale made famous by Ansel Adams. You have a huge range of effect.