Reportage: Farewell at Faro Airport

Day Twenty of my 365 Day Sketch Challenge

Continuing with day twenty of my #Kick365 sketching challenge to draw people in ink and watercolour. Sketching from photos and a freeze-frame video.

Drawing Earthsworld Challenge

I did today’s Drawing Earthsworld Challenge from Facebook. Been feeling a little less confident with line work this week – still feeling the effects of having the flu. So I did a loose pencil sketch first, and then after a short break, I added my ink lines.

I’ve been relying too heavily on my pigment liner 0.05 recently. It creates nice safe lines, and it’s a very forgiving way to sketch, but I really wanted to shake up my Earthsworld sketch today. I grabbed my Fude pen instead for some line weight variation.

It’s also too easy to fall into a safe combination for skin tones, which I feel I did with my Oliver sketch earlier today, so I picked out my favourite colour triad of opera rose, hansa yellow medium, and cobalt turquoise light (CTL).

I used the pink and yellow to create a warm orange for the skin tone base, and then added in a little bit of CTL, to desaturate it a little for the mid-level skin tones.

For the shadow, I went a little overboard with the CTL in the mix. I wanted more of a blue shade, but it was greener than I intended, but went with it anyway. Then to lift the skin with some warmth, I added in some splashes of opera rose for the skin highlights.

The hair was rendered with the same trio of colours. Not as warm, but I wanted to create a cohesion between skin and hair.

The source photo had this subject with a purple vest on, and rather than mixing a flat purple with the opera rose and CTL, I used the puddle approach to mixing secondary colours that Oliver covered in his recent tutorial. And varied whether I picked up a cooler or warmer purple variant from the puddle before applying it to the paper.

Portrait Sketch from a Freeze Frame Video

I signed up for a Colour Confidence course from urban sketcher Oliver Hoeller last year, but the festive season interrupted my motivation to get any traction on the tutorials. The first tutorial is 3 hours long, so it takes a bit of a commitment to get through it.

Whenever I start a set of tutorials I like to sketch a portrait of the instructor. It’s my way of establishing my commitment to the learning process, and helps to create a connection to the artist.

I decided to forego my usual cobalt turquoise light eyes, and used a gold pen. Not sure why, but I actually like the effect. The skin tone is reminiscent of the colour selection and the way I applied the colour in yesterday’s Earthsworld portrait. I liked the amount of white/light I left in his portrait, but also the messy and loose application of the colour.

The biggest win on this portrait was that “likeness” wasn’t even a consideration. I drew what and how I wanted to draw, and I liked the result. My assessment focused on the skin tone and loose lines, and the stylistic choice of using gold for the eyes, but nowhere in the assessment was “does it even look like him?”

Sketch from Travel Photo

When we dropped our rental car off at the airport a couple of weeks ago, I photographed a warm embrace and overhead the conversation between these two women.

It’s moments like these that motivate me to build my people sketching skills. I really want to be able to capture and sketch these moments live, so that’s what I’m working towards. I want to become so familiar with gesture and features, that I can render both quickly and confidently. So that means lots of practice from photographs to build my skills.

What’s the Story?

I love the potential story associated with this photo. I presume that one of these ladies is returning back to France, after spending time with this Portugal resident. We have no idea of their relationship, but there’s a fondness there. But the fact that they’re advising each other of the kissing cultures in the two different countries leads us to believe that this is the first time they’ve said goodbye, so maybe a fairly new relationship?

The sunglasses leaves us a clue that it’s been a sunny day. And the French lady is bundled up in a warm winter coat ready for her return to northern Europe. The other lady has a sheer black blouse on, but no coat. The luggage trolley helps to set the location.

I love the element of reportage in this sketch. Reportage doesn’t have to depict a big story or important message, it can be a simple slice of life that piques your interest and lets your imagination wander.

I can’t wait until I’m feeling a little better and can head out to a cafe to do some urban sketching.