In the garden with a pen

Lines and shapes

Welcome to all of my new subscribers! Typically when I share my sketchbook pages you'll see my coffee cup and possibly a bit of my breakfast plate around my drawing. But not today. Today we're in the Portland Japanese Garden while I'm drawing in my sketchbook with my Sailor Fude fountain pen. My wife

J. L. Sullens

took these photos and videos of me drawing in the garden.

Here is what I was looking at in the garden.

Here are two videos my wife took, one focused on my hands, the other more generally.

Here's my finished sketch.

After doing the basic drawing with my fountain pen I used a water brush and purposefully smeared the fountain pen ink to create the shades and tones. Here's a look at my pen and the water brush the only art supplies I took in my bag on this trip to the garden.

Here's a closer look at my pen. It came with a “bent nib” that allows me to draw a variety of line sizes simply by adjusting the way I hold the pen.

I did several other drawings in the garden. Here in succession: what I was seeing and what I drew.

My focus today was line and shape. I'm easily seduced by the colors in the garden but occasionally I find it helpful to drill down on line and shape in shades of grey and black tones. To look at color is like enjoying a singer's music. To look at line and shape is like reading the printed words to the song and picking out the melody.

Here's another recent visit to the garden - I did color drawings in this visit 👇

Here's a more typical sketchbook page that my subscribers see: an imaginary character and my handwritten thought. Notice my coffee and breakfast plate. 😊

Thank you again for subscribing - and a special thank you to paying subscribers - I appreciate you all!

I hope you're able to see something beautiful this weekend.