I don’t know why my process didn’t work as usual this time, but for some reason my muse was not in the game. It took a very long time to find a subject to draw. I took dozens of photos every day, but no single shot captured my attention in that special way that made me want to draw it.
Sometimes I can easily see a shot, sometimes I can set one up, but most of the time I find them hiding in the many extra photos I take. I shuffle though them, crop them, and run them through filters to shake up my way of looking at them to find a gem. In any case, though, I’ve got to get that feeling of ‘eureka.’
Muses, as you know, work on their own schedule, so I had to wait. I finally found this shot of next year’s buds in my lilac bush that caught my attention, and was I captivated by the way this year’s leaves curved through space around them. (The buds are quite small, so you might not spot them immediately.)
I’m using Aches hotpress watercolor paper and Mars Lumograph pencils to draw this piece. I chose the Arches paper because of its texture and the Lumograph pencils because of their quality. Other pencils can create the same beautiful grainy ‘wash’ effect that I love, but I’m spoiled by the Lumograph’s graphite quality and range.
As always, I start with a tracing that I consider a sort of map. I partially erase the tracing lines and re-draw the part of the drawing I’m working on with more detail. The original tracing lines help keep the drawing in proportion.
The first part of the drawing is always a little up in the air because I’m figuring out which pencils to use to create the values. These beginning leaf values were at an odd place between pencil grades, which made getting to the correct value a bit of a challenge.
Once I figured out which pencils were needed to create the values, the leaves were fairly straight forward to draw. They are really just large gradations of value with veins and stems. I created the veins in the leaves by outlining where I wanted them, and then by hatching around those lines. Then I added value to the veins afterward, if needed, with a harder pencil. I drew the lighter leaf edges by just hatching short of the edge.
I made this leaf look like it’s curving back into space by shading the ‘curved’ edge slightly darker than the rest of the leaf, and then by softening that edge. To soften an edge, I use a sharp lead to create 45 degree angled hatching that overlaps the edge slightly. That blurs the edge, or ‘softens’ it.
The area under the leaf buds is the only place where this drawing has any real depth. It’s also the focal point of the drawing, so I was concerned that the buds look oddly “outlined” in the photo and I couldn’t extract much more visual information about them. (You’ll have to enlarge the image to see what I mean.) I hope the buds look real enough next to all these heavily gradated leaves.
I was originally tempted to draw the buds larger than what they were in the photo to emphasize them, but decided not to because I thought any attempt of that type might make them look even more artificial.
A masking tape edge has come loose, lifted, and folded over on itself, so a section of one edge of my drawing is now ragged looking. I’ll have to fix it after I remove the tape, which will be a pain. I use Scotch Low Tack Artist Tape, and this has never happened before. Damn.
Conclusion
The most challenging part of this drawing was keeping the leaves in the same relative value to each other and also to the other leaves in the picture. My results were varied, but I think the drawing still works.
This drawing is lighter in key than the photo (below), however I was not trying to create a photo-perfect drawing, and I’m happy with how this turned out. The leaves do define their positions in space, and the small leaf buds stand out well enough. The drawing reminds me that as one season ends, another prepares to emerge. I like that.
Keep drawing everyone,
Carol
