Part 3 - Assignment 3

I have some freedom to decide what to do for this assignment but there is some guidance.

• an outdoor scene that includes natural vegetation
• use linear perspective
• take the opportunity to draw straight line objects like fences or buildings

I have to make preliminary sketches and experiment with composition and then try out a variety of media to check out what suits the subject best considering atmosphere and energy.

I feel drawn back to the countryside in particular to Treswell Wood.  Tomorrow I will take a walk and look for possible subjects.

For once the weather was good.  Although it was very cold the harsh wind had gone, the sun was out and the Wood was peaceful.  In the Wood there are a range of wooden sheds and shelters - none in the first flush of youth.  They are used for storing products of the Wood, like bean poles and for the volunteers who manage the Wood to take a break.  I wandered around these buildings with my camera and absorbed the atmosphere.  There were lots of birds, I saw a fox and best of all three roe deer.

Here are some of my photos:

A range of sheds and shelters for the woodsmen
showing linear and aerial perpective

Treswell Wood is very atmospheric

Bean poles under cover in the open shelter

The door of a tumbledown shed with green mould

It was a quite magical morning and I want to capture some of the magic.

As a little additional bit of atmospheric information this lovely, but complex, photo is one my husband took last week while he was working in the wood:

Treswell on a sunny winter morning

The trees in the background look hazy and almost pink and the trunks are really dark in contrast.   It was almost midday but the shadows are long and show the bumpy terrain where the earth has been moved to create the new track.  There are icy puddles in the foreground.

I used charcoal (made in the Wood) to make some very quick sketches.

Sketch 1 - The open shelter straight on, looking to the far wall

Sketch 2 - the open shelter

Sketch 3 - The open shelter from the other end

Sketch 4 - The tumbledown shed

These sketches were rapid and they have a rusticity that fits with the Wood very well.  I will use these to make some more detailed drawings and then select the best to develop for my assignment.  I think I will need to refer to my photos for detail.

Because I liked it best I drew Sketch 4.  The shed is slowly falling into disrepair and will soon be just a pile of wood on the floor. Using pencil, a little charcoal and very little white soft pastel I tried to get this feeling of the shed being at one with the Wood.

The tumbledown shed
(from Sketch 4)

I think the composition works: the shed is the focus but there is interest elsewhere.  The eye is led around with the gate and the logs against the tree trunk. Maybe the fallen branches on the right emphasise the tree rather too  much.  The undergrowth is dense and crackly underfoot and there are spindly trees right in the foreground.  I need to look at ways to depict the undergrowth because whichever sketch I pursue I'm going to need it.  I'm pleased with this but it doesn't fulfil the perspective criteria all that well.  I think it is a very traditional sort of drawing offering nothing of the unexpected.
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I think Sketch 3 will offer me what I need perspective wise but I'll not be able to do it for a couple of days.  In the meantime I'll give some thought to trying something a little more adventurous.

What I decided to do was use black ink and try to get a variety of tones to indicate distance.  The "adventurous" bit is in the equipment I chose to use.

Equipment for my drawing

I chose

• Seawhite 150 gsm paper
• Quink black ink in a variety of strengths
• pieces of corrugated card - various lengths - foreground trees and shed roof
• pieces of flat card - various lengths - all lines for buildings and logs in foreground
• a cocktail stick - good for fine grass
• a cotton bud - long smooth lines - for path and trees
• a piece of packaging - made good lines and stippled well - really useful

I was amazed that I could get such a wide variety of marks and that I could render my scene quite accurately.  I wish that I had started with a pale ink wash because the white particularly in the sheds looks very stark.

Open shelter and sheds

The tones could have been better distinguished.  I must remember that like water colour diluted ink dries paler.  The lane goes uphill and I'm pleased that I managed to make it look as though it does.  I think there's a little work to do on shadows across the lane and some highlights on the side of the trees.

With some highlights and shadows

I used soft pastels to put in some highlights on the trees and shadows on the lane.  I think they perhaps look a bit heavy handed. I may smudge them.  I'm not sure how the ink will react to fixative so I won't bother with it.  As my finger was a bit black with pastel I rubbed it into the doorways.