Day 128 of sketching people in ink and watercolour. Today I sketched a couple of sunburned people at the café and added some poetic reportage to capture the scene. I also added coffee stained backgrounds.

Day 127 of sketching people in the waiting room of a government office in Faro. Experimenting with page layout by adding signs to help convey the location of the sketch, and filling negative space with some poetic reportage.

Day 126 of sketching people. Drawing is Free speed sketching event on zoom. Sketched a series of portraits, where every pose is the length of a music track. Simple ink lines and tonal sketching on 5x8cm pieces of watercolour paper. I also did Dylan Sara’s 10 minute sketch-along on YouTube.

Day 125 of sketching people at cafés in Tavira and Cabanas. Experimenting with page layout and composition, to see how well overlapping figures, and using V and L shapes layouts works.

Day 124 of sketching people at Faro hospital, where I added a bit of poetry to my sketch to memorialise the moment with a bit of reportage. Also continued my fasciation with biro portraits, using Earthsworld photo references.

Here’s an image gallery of my urban sketches of people where I’ve add a bit of social or cultural commentary in poetic form to elevate my illustrations into reportage.

Day 123 of sketching people at a local cafe. Added a bit of poetry to a couple of my sketches for a bit of reportage. Also continued my fasciation with biro portraits.

Day 122 of sketching people. Working my way through the second week of Dylan Sara’s facial features course which focused on sketching the nose. Which culminated in a coloured pencil portrait.

Day 121 of sketching people. Biro sketches with tonal shading from online resource images, and a couple of urban sketches at the cafe in ink and watercolour.

Day 115 of sketching people in ink and watercolour. An array of sketches on coffee-stained pages using water soluble ink and pencils for tonal shading. Followed by a few speed sketches from the Pencils4Tea zoom session.

Day 113 of sketching people in ink and watercolour. A return trip to the hospital, and filling the waiting time with sketches of other people waiting.

Day 112 of sketching people. Drawing is Free speed sketching event on zoom. And completing a sketch study sequence, which was another exercise in speed sketching.

Day 111 of sketching people. Working my way through the first week of Dylan Sara’s facial features course which focused on sketching the eye. Sketching eyes in ink, and a portrait in watercolour pencil.

Tips fro Teoh Yi Chie about the different ways he approaches urban sketching groups of people, and what he focuses on when sketching quickly vs. sketching slowly.

Day 110 of sketching people. Drawing is Free speed sketching event on zoom. Sketched a series of portraits, where every pose is the length of a music track. Simple ink lines and tonal sketching with a little spot watercolour.

Day 109 of sketching people in ink and watercolour. An unfortunate trip to the hospital, but filling the waiting time with sketches.

Using the first pen I bought when I started sketching – the Yellow Lamy Safari fountain pen – to experiment turning the F nib into a Fude nib.

Painting loose isn’t just about wobbly lines. Inspired by a video by Whee Teck on how to paint more loosely, I absorbed his advice about disrespecting the lines to create a looser feel to sketches.

To create a looser looking sketch you use your watercolour to lose your edges or replace your ink lines. Here’s a look at how using paint splatters or faded edges helps to create a looser looking urban sketches.

A look at why I’m inspired to sketch the people I sketch, and how I approach choosing the starting point, and focal point of each sketch. What happens when I’m not inspired, and what happens when I leave objects out.

Day 105 of sketching during a day our flight out of Lille. I sketched people before our flight and during our flight. A good end to our trip, with some pleasing people sketches completed.

Day 103 and 104 of sketching people. During our trip to Lille I only managed to sketch people at the train station and on our metro ride to a museum housed in an Art Deco swimming pool.

Day 102 of sketching during a day trip to Brugge. Looking at the impact of negative space and how to create a strong sketch of a person using a triangular shape as the key compositional element.

In Paris for day 98, 99, and 100 of urban sketching people. Experimenting how to manipulate the line and colour on a page to create a sketch that has a clear visual path and a strong focal point.