Sunday 2 October 2011

Rose Hips in Coloured Pencil

TUTORIAL

This is a long tutorial, many steps but since I know many of you have difficulty to understand the process, I thought it's better to share every little step I took in creating this drawing. Enjoy :)

Materials

Every twig with rose hips is different of course so only use this list of colours as a guide. Of course you can use my list but I strongly suggest you have a good look at your own rose hips to see what colours will be best for you.
This list is not complete. I used a lot of different other colours for smaller details. It is wise to get as much different colours so you have large range to pick from.

  • Coloured Pencils:

Faber-Castell
234 Cold Grey VI
235 Cold Grey V
141 Delft Blue
278 Chrome Oxide Green
175 Dark Sepia
126 Permanent Carmine
223 Deep Red
121 Pale Geranium Lake
113 Light Orange
171 Light Green
168 Earth Green Yellowish

Prismacolor
1067 Cool Grey 90%
996 Grape
1095 Black Raspberry
925 Crimson Lake
923 Scarlet Lake
937 Tuscan Red
917 Sunburst Yellow
940 Sand
938 White
1026 Greyed Lavender
1087 Powder Blue

Yes, I use a lot of colours, I know :P
  • Graphite pencils: HB, B, 2H, and the hardest you can get (I have 10H)
  • Tracing paper
  • Lyra Splender Blender (or another colourless pencil blender)
  • Electric Eraser (like Sakura)
  • kneadable eraser
  • Embossing stylus, the thinnest you can get with a rounded tip. I use the Pergamano 0,5 10031.
  • Low tack Frisket Film (you just need a small piece of that)
  • Sketchbook/Sketching paper
  • A sheet of HP watercolour paper. I use Fabriano 5. Any brand is good as long as it’s white and HP (which is very smooth). Don’t use Bristol because that will smudge too fast.
  • A very good sharpener for your pencils.
  • Fine sandpaper for sharpening the pencils.
  • Eraser shield is optional

Step 1: Line Drawing



First of all you make a drawing of the twig in your sketchbook. Once you’re happy with it, make sure to erase all the sketch lines and mistakes, leaving a clean line drawing.
Now you trace this and transfer it on to your watercolour paper. Be very careful not to press your pencil too hard in the paper (this is very important!). Go over the graphite transfer lines with a very hard and pointed pencil (and don’t press too hard!!!). Draw very light, just enough to see the lines. Use your kneadable eraser to clean the paper, removing all the graphite powder from the tracing.

Step 2: White highlights


Before you start colouring anything you have to put the highlights in. I mean the very, very lightest parts. For now we'll call it white. The larger white reflections you can do with a white coloured pencil. I prefer to use my PC 938 because it is more "fat" than the Faber-Castell white. The tiny little spots of white or small light coloured light you want to save can be marked by using the embossing stylus. You press a little dimple in the paper so the next layers of colours won't reach that paper and stay white.

Step 3: Tonal Base



Now take the Faber-Castell greys and start putting in the shadows. Don’t press too hard. Make your shadows darker by taking a darker grey, not by pressing harder. Work gentle with small movements. Make small overlapping ellipses. Always use a sharp point, so often use your sharpener or sandpaper. Don’t push the greys too far into your drawing. Be sure to soften the edges to the white so you get a nice fade.

Step 4: Darkest shadow colours

Now squint your eyes and try to see only colours. What is the basic red, what is the colour in the darkest parts, what colours do you detect in the lighter parts. The parts that aren’t ripened entirely might be more green or orange. Make some colour studies on a scrap piece of paper. Layer some colours to see the effect.
Now start with the darkest colour for the shadows. Don’t pick a darker version of the base colour, don’t pick dark red. Pick something that glows through the red. I used Faber-Castell (FC) 141 Delft Blue and FC 278 Chrome Oxide Green. Again, add a very thin layer and don’t press too hard. Always a sharp point and gentle, gentle, gentle...

Step 5: First Colour


Take the colour you see all over the hips (the main colour). For me it was FC 126 Permanent Carmine. Put a soft layer of this red all over the hips where you can see that colour. Of course not on the white parts and not in the parts where it has a totally different colour.
As you can see I did the same with the twig, using FC 278 Chrome Oxide Green and FC 175 Dark Sepia in the shadows and FC 171 Light Green as the main colour.


Step 6: Deepen the colours


Have a look at the hips and look what colours you see “hidden” in the main red colour. I can see some orange glowing through the red in the lighter parts. Other parts have some blueish purple, I also see some browner reds. Put the right colour in those parts. In the image you can see I’ve added the FC 113 Light Orange. Still you’re not pressing the layers. Don’t forget to sharpen your pencils and work with small gentle movements. Don’t concentrate on details yet.

Step 7: Deepen the shadows


This is when I will make the shadows darker. I used a bit more FC 278 Chrome Oxide Green and Prismacolor (PC) 1095 Black Raspberry. I go really dark in the shadows and almost black where there are overlaps. Be sure you don’t go too dark near the edges.

Step 8: Deepen Reds


Take all your reds and layer your reds until you are happy with the colour. Try to use the FC pencils first and the PC last. When you feel good about it you can start using a bit more pressure to blend the colours together. Also put a layer of red over the shadows.

Step 9: Going Back To The Shadows



You might notice that the shadows got a bit weakened by the reds. So go back there and add again more colour. I used more PC 1095 Black Raspberry and in some parts a bit of FC 175 Dark Sepia and also PC 996 Grape.
The shadows in the rose hips closest to the viewer are darker. This is where I used more Black Raspberry. The hips further away have more Grape. This because it’s a cooler and a bit lighter colour. It’s a bit of aerial perspective.

Step 10: Blend the Reds


Now start blending all red layers with red coloured pencils. What I mean by that is that now you can start using more pressure to get a paint like effect and mix all the colours of the previous layers together. I love to use my Prismacolor pencils for this because the colours are just a bit deeper and stronger than the Faber-Castell pencils.
Be very careful not to go in the white parts. And even in this stage... keep your points sharp!

Step 11: The highlights
 


Now it is time to add the highlights. I used the PC 938 White. Be very careful to work from the white part to the red colour. Clean your pencil point every time it has been into the red and you want to go back into the white again. I also use the white with some pressure over the reds around the highlights as well.

Step 12: Reflected Light


After the highlights I take my PC Powder blue or a light cool grey or a greyed Lavender, what ever looks best, and add the reflected light in the shadows and around the shadow edge. Use a very sharp point and do this carefully. You want a sharp edge.
Now use the blender pencil all over the hips (but avoiding the white). If you feel the colours turned a bit dull you can lift it by adding a bit of red over it.

Step 13: Details

Finally you can concentrate on the details. You will probably see that some tiny embossed highlight points are gone or nearly gone. You can still see the tiny dents but the blending might have pushed some colour in. You can lift this by using some low tack Frisket film and your embossing tool. See the photos to see the magic happen.


You can use the Frisket film or your electric eraser to lift colour from the parts where “nasty brown bits” are. Small damages, beasty bites and things like that. These not so perfect parts give a lot of charm to the hips and make them more alive.


Peel some of the paper off the film and lay it over the part where you need to lift the colour. DON’T stick the film on the drawing!!!!


Take your stylus and make a tiny dot where the highlight should have been. You can also add a few new highlights like this if you feel it needs more white spots or lines.

Step 14: Sharpening the Lines

The drawing will look best if your lines are clean and sharp. On the other hand you don’t want it to be too sharp and crisp.
Most important is to have very, very sharp points on your pencils. It helps if you use a harder pencil than the Prismacolor pencils. Faber-Castell is hard but there is also the Prismacolor Verithin range. Very hard and very useful. The only problem is that you can only get it in the US.

Work from the “inside” of the drawing (see photo).



Finally you can use the hardest graphite pencil you can get (I have a 10H) and make a crisp line on the edge of your drawing. The reason why you need a hard pencil for this is that it gives a very thin line (use the sandpaper to make it dangerously sharp) but it hardly gives you a grey line.

Don’t overdo this crisp lining. Use it on tiny details, thin lines and very carefully along the stalks and stems. If you do too much or use a line that is too dark (too soft pencil) it will look artificial.



At the end, clean the paper with the kneadable eraser. Large boo-boos you can remove with the electric eraser (use an eraser shield if you need to do that near the drawing).


Finally

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial and that it all made sense, helped you and made you (more) enthusiastic about making botanical art with coloured pencils.

.

Monday 12 September 2011

Painting in Eenrum

Last weekend I was invited to demonstrate botanical art and sell my paintings, prints and cards at "my" nursery De Kleine Plantage in Eenrum. For some years now they are selling my cards in their shop and every year I'm invited for the Liefhebbersdagen. It's in the second weekend of September and many other nurseries, bulb sellers, specialised shops, bookstores, etc. are invited to show and sell their goods at De Kleine Plantage. It's always quite a big event garden and plant lovers in the Northern part of The Netherlands. I took some photos again this year. It's so nice to look at the plants that are flowering now, finding new introductions of plants and of course to meet up with friends who share the same passion.
Down below you'll find the tiny painting I made last weekend. It's Clematis 'Jan Fopma'.

The beautiful border of pots and containers at the entrance of the nursery:


The plants for sale, ordered by colour. It's nice to see plants of the same colour all together, easy to combine and it looks wonderful too.


This is at the greenhouse where I was painting. Part of the greenhouse was made into a tearoom, the other part was for a jewellery maker, a book store selling old and antique gardening books and me. On Sunday also Gert Tabak and Ton ter Linden joined us with their cards and books.


 
There were quite a few bulb sellers. The biggest of all was Hein Meeuwissen. Unfortunately I didn't have time to get some bulbs myself but I will order some. The displays of all the sellers was so mouthwatering....




Some of the plants that caught my eye at the nursery....

Allium tuberosum

Aster 'Vasterival'

Clematis 'Dark Eyes'

Clematis 'Princess Kate'

Clematis viticella 'Maria Cornelia'

Echinacea 'Maui Sunshine'

Kosteletzkya virginica

Purple Kale

And here he is: Clematis 'Jan Fopma'

Saturday 23 July 2011

Quail Eggs



I found these little quail eggs in the supermarket yesterday. I couldn't resist.

Watercolour on Lana HP.

Monday 13 June 2011

I'm a bad blogger

I know... I really should post more often than I do but I keep postponing it like I do with so many have-to-do-things. Times have been incredibly busy. I'm working every day now that Bertus is going to school. I've worked hard on the bulb project for next year's exhibition. If you missed that, I blogged about that here. I made many sketches of the Ornithogalum and I'll do that later this year (after autumn).


I'm really hard working on a huge painting of the Spanish Bluebells. I like that one a lot.


I made a painting of the Arisaema fargesii rhizome. Now I'm waiting for it to grow and hopefully flower so I can do the rest. I also did a few other species of Arisaema rhizomes. They have such a funny shape and the different textures are really nice to paint.


The Narcissus didn't flower, oddly enough. But I can't say I'm very sad about that. I don't like Narcissus that much and above all it was a double one. Not my taste really.


In the meantime I did a little study of Rosa moyesii 'Geranium' Trying to do the first layers of the petals wet in wet. It worked. So perhaps I'll try it more often, now that I know it's not that difficult. Also I'm painting some tiny rosebuds on vellum now. That is a lot of fun because it is fast result and the colours stay so brilliant. It's not finished yet but here's how it looks so far.


Other news is that I sold my Nectaroscordum painting last week at the annual group exhibition of the Dutch Society of Botanical Artists. I also sold a little painting of the black tulip 'Queen of Night'. A really fun flower to paint and not as hard as it looks. Really it's not!


I'm working now, besides the painting, on a new website. It will again contain a webshop where you can buy prints and cards and probably some originals. Also a big portfolio.
Even more exciting news is that my coloured pencil drawing of Polygonatum was published in the summer issue of "De Tuin, exclusief". I'm really proud of that since I think it's the most beautiful garden magazine.

 

I probably did draw and paint a couple of other things but these up here were the most interesting. I'll post the buds on vellum when it's finished. And that really should be soon ;))

Sunday 8 May 2011

Blackcap nest

Blackcap nest, originally uploaded by Sigrid Frensen.
I have a pair of blackcaps nesting beside my front door in the Akebia. Not hidden at all and if it was built a few inches lower I could look into it. Yesterday I managed to take this photo of the eggs when the birds were gone for a few minutes. 5 Tiny eggs.

Today the male was on the nest and he seems a bit more brave than the female. He didn't fly away when we walked in and out the house but stayed on the eggs and looked at us a bit scared. What a man.... I guess the female was admiring her husband from a tree nearby enjoying her Mother's day ♥ *swoon* ♥

Saturday 2 April 2011

Plant and seed shopping

I went to Eenrum again today, to my nursery "De Kleine Plantage". Mainly because they sell my cards and lot of them were sold out. I never leave empty handed when I go there. They have so much pretty plants and things. But no big buys today, even though it was their Roses and Clematis weekend. I want a peach coloured rose in my front garden but didn't find one that was good enough. Most of the ones that had nice flowers grew on shrubs that were too low for the place where I want it. Other roses with great flowers (gorgeous even) were ramblers. Also not what I need right now. I guess I'll have to look elsewhere or just alter my plans, go for something red instead or something.
Anyway.... I did buy some plants and some seeds. Here's what I bought:

- Agastache "Black Adder":
photo: Guy Hendrieckx 
- Foeniculum vulgare "Giant Bronze" (had it for years and love it):

Anemone 'Rosenschale':
photo: De Kleine Plantage

Lythrum salicaria 'Blush':
photo: Adam Woodruff

And these seeds:


- Eschscholzia californica 'Milky White':
photo: Annie's Annuals
Tropaeolum majus 'Salmon Gleam':
photo: Deeproot Plant Base

Tropaeolum 'Black Velvet':
photo: Busy Bee
 Lathyrus tingitanus:
photo: Florus
Cosmos Rubenza:
photo: Sericea

Papaver rhoeas 'Parelmoer':

Scabiosa atropurpurea 'Black Knight':
photo: Photofarmer

Sowing tomorrow with Bertus :))