Tuesdays and Wednesdays are the days that I focus almost exclusively on my SketchingNow course (currently it’s the Group Run-through of my Foundations course) so I didn’t have time to do anything new. I simply had two sessions at my local cafe, using a similar technique that I’ve used in previous years of this challenge. Today I almost left the cafe at the 45-minute mark as it was so quiet and there were no patrons to sketch, but I’m glad I stayed as it eventually got busier. I ended up hitting my quota and having two lovely conversations – so it was a great session in the end.

Right now, I’m at 82 people sketched on location at this point (with an additional 60 drawn at home from photos) so I’m very happy with that.

A few quick thoughts:

• It’s so much easier to achieve the daily quota of 20 when there are a lot of different people to sketch, so choosing a busy location is essential. When there are lots of people to choose from it’s easier to get into the flow.
• The consistent thought while doing this challenge: In order to successfully sketch moving people I have to have a good knowledge of the human figure in my head and use this knowledge to complete the sketch after my subject has moved. (Implying that I need to do so much more research!)
• I’ve started using a pencil for the initial capture of the gesture/shape and I do find it easier to have a technique that allows for this first capture and that I can then refine further.
• My paint-water is getting very dirty during a session as I’m painting one person at a time and therefore constantly changing colours. 🙂
• As I mentioned on Monday, talking to people and sharing my work is by far the best part of this challenge!
• Another consistent thought: How do I keep this up once the challenge is over? 🙂

Here are my sketches…

I’ve really got to start thinking about the scavenger hunt list now – although I already have 7 points!