Boatyard

Still experimenting with the watercolours. In the first drawing I got carried away with the shading and ended up scribbling all over the place so in the next I tried to use a lighter touch...

Watercolour Car 4

Here's another. I was aiming for something whale like but I think I can take it much further and make the link more obvious...

Matthew Watercolour

Had another go at the Matthew - a replica of John Cabot's boat in which he discovered Newfoundland (Although I have a feeling that the Native Americans knew it was there all along)...

Hot Rods

More little thumbnails. The first are made up ones, the second are actual cars seen at the Hot Rod Drags, Shakespeare County Raceway...

SS Great Britain

Another quick watercolour - I drew it a bit too small so it gets rather muddled around the windows. The buildings behind are darker than I would have liked too. Still, it's a lovely ship. It sits in the dock in which it was built in the early 1840's. Designed by Brunel it was one of the first ships to be made of iron, to have a screw and was 1,000 tons larger than any other ship in existence...

Dockside Train Carriage

Lunchtime quickie...

Watercolour Car Test 3

Another made up vintage car - loosely based on one of the thumbnails. Watercolours are definitely easier to use on proper watercolour paper - you can correct mistakes and it doesn't go all wrinkly. I don't like the lumpy surface though and it's hard to find really smooth stuff.

Which Would You Drive?

These are little 1 inch thumbnail doodles...

Energie again

We're having beautiful weather at the moment which makes the docks a very pleasant place to sit at lunchtime. Here's the big houseboat 'Energie' again...

Avona

Here's another boat in the docks. I like all the jumbled equipment on the deck...

Jappic

Haven't really done this car justice - still battling with the watercolours and over did it a bit again. This car was powered by a 344cc JAP engine and set a record for the flying mile at 70.33mph. I love the simplicity of it and its low slung stance. Unfortunately it was destroyed in a fire at Monthlery...

Energie

Quick sketch of the front of one of the house boats in the docks. Overworked it as usual - I'm finding it really hard not to do too much when it comes to watercolour.

Stutz Black Hawk

Here's another land speed record car. It's one of the most beautiful cars but unfortunately has a tragic story attached to it. Frank Lockhart built it using two supercharged 1.5 litre straight eights. This made for quite a compact, lightweight car - quite an unusual approach at the time - he was competing against Seagrave's 1000hp Sunbeam.

The first attempt at Ormond Beach in Florida ended with him surviving a crash at over 200mph - landing in the sea itself. He returned to try again a few months later but this time wasn't so lucky - a burst rear tyre sent the car into a barrel roll - again at over 200mph.

Watercolour Car Test 2

Here's another made up one - done on a postcard sized watercolour pad...

MG EX135 'Humbug'

Back to real cars. This is the 1100cc MG that George Eyston drove to a class speed record of 128.69mph in 1934 at Monthlery...

Watercolour Car Tests

I doodled a few made up vintage cars and decided to try some real-life watercolours on them instead of the digital variety. I'm quite pleased with them but think I ought to use proper paper. Strangely I like looking at the scan full size - bigger than it is in the sketch book - you notice all sorts of interesting things that the paint has done as it runs into itself. Perhaps I should just work bigger and with a bigger brush - then I wouldn't have to enlarge them to see the fun stuff...

Space Cardboard

Been doodling with the marker pens again. I saw a tutorial once where it showed how to make random overlapping marks with a fat marker to rapidly produce lots of interesting silhouettes. Then you can go in and pick out details and add highlights to make it into something. It's quite fun..

Cardboard

At work our fancy printer cartridges come in nice sturdy cardboard boxes. I've used them to make odd things every now and again (snoots for flashes etc) but I thought it would be a fun material to draw on.

Here's a couple of tests. On the second I was trying out some different pens including an extra broad copic marker and a weird Kuretake chalk pastel pen. When you first draw with it it's invisible and then slowly the white appears as the 'ink' dries. I need to experiment a bit more but it's fun to have a few more tones to play with...

Pretty Flowers

Here is the picture I did for Mum. It's perhaps the first watercolour I've been happy with as I managed to avoid overworking it...



Incidentally, I've put together a little gallery of some of my favourite sketches from other Flickr users. Take a look - It'll either inspire you or put you off trying to draw for life...

Flickr Gallery - Beautiful Drawings

The Chieftain

Went out with a view to doing a pretty watercolour for my mum's birthday. Instead I drew a lifeboat.

It's a Liverpool class lifeboat - which came into service after the war. This was the last one to retire in 1982. More info and photos can be found here. It was beautifully constructed - particularly the cabin which had been made seamless by bending (presumably steamed) planks around from the roof to the sides. Set into this were some very nice brass fittings and portholes.

This is the original sketch...

But I think I prefer the monotone version...
(Don't worry - I did some flowers for Mum this morning)

Wrington and Bristol

Couple of quick sketches done whilst out and about...

It Lives!

This is the car I sketched a few months back on a trailer. Cathy's brother took it all apart and then rebuilt it, fabricating parts and strengthening it as he went along. It still needs tweaking and a coat of paint but it works and I got to have a go. It makes an awesome noise. When you sit in it it feels as if your body is below ground and only your head is sticking up above the surface...