Monday, April 12, 2010

Sag Harbor


The Bay in Sag Harbor, 10" x 5" watercolor in sketchbook

We got out of town this weekend and spent time with friends
at their lovely weekend home in Sag Harbor. Sunny but cool,
it was a treat to get out
of the city. I finally broke out my
sketchbook and painted this
watercolor (above) one afternoon on the bay.


I was a little rusty. I spent the first few hours warming up by
simply drawing my coffee cup over and over again, as I sat outside
on the terrace:




I started with just an ink pen (far right, below) and also some
Faber-Castell Big Brush pens (left and center, below) to
fill out the form of the cup.


It was a good warm up, just drawing the same simple
form over and over again. And then I added
some color, using my
small travel watercolor set:




Just a simple series of drawings but they loosened me up enough
to tackle the beach landscape.

I'd invested in a travel watercolor kit, just 6"x4" in size,
with collapsible brush. When brand new, they look like this:



After a few hours of painting, however, mine now looks like this:


Worth the mess. I think I"m going to try and use this kit and
sketchbook during my
lunch hours at work, now that the sun
has begun to shine in NYC.

8 comments:

Melanie said...

I love the drawing of the bay and the coffee cup evolution!!!

Jaime Haney said...

lovely landscape. I enjoy seeing your practice sketches and hearing about your thought process. thanks for sharing.

I love that watercolor travel kit! where did you buy it?

VH McKenzie said...

Thanks, Jaime. I bought it at my local Utrecht store for about $28.

You can also buy it online - \http://www.dickblick.com/products/van-gogh-watercolor-sets/

dickblick.com sells it for $22.99 plus shipping, so that's about the same cost.

dinahmow said...

Yep! My colours look much the same!

Samarjit Roy said...

This pan cake water color boxes are really very good at giving washes. I used use like this type (though much inferior quality) as a kid. [:)]

VH McKenzie said...

Yes, Sam, I was quite pleased with the quality of the pans in this set. The colors were quite strong and intense -- I had to add a lot of water, they were so good.

Much better than my childhood sets, too!

Laura Goggin Photography said...

Ooo, seeing your paint set is inspiring me!

VH McKenzie said...

Good, Goggla! This is a fit-in-your-pocket set. Got it at Utrecht on 4th Ave. near 11th Street. Hope to tear up the EV with it now that the sun is showing its face more often.