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| Parallel pens - drawing results |
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| Parallel pen 3.8mm & Hero ink |
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| Parallel pen 3.8mm |
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| Parallel pen 1.5mm and line tests |
I had these and one more for more than a couple of years. Kept them for a long time and decided to bring them out into the light again. Initially these were hard to control at first but after a while it becomes obvious that there is no point trying to tame these babies but it is better to let them do their thing by themselves. Lines produced by these pens can be pretty expressive but at times you could also get very clean lines from them too.
Claude Monet would draw and paint a subject repetitively. He was famous for doing the "Haystack", "Waterloo Bridge", "Rouen Cathedral" and the "Water Lillies" series. Monet painted the Rouen Cathedral's facade at different times of day to explore the effects of different light during Winter, and in 1895, he exhibited 20 Cathedral paintings at the Durand-Ruel Gallery. (source:
http://www.theartstory.org/artist-monet-claude-artworks.htm#pnt_5)
There is one location in Singapore I have been back again and again to draw and paint. Till date I have done more than 50 pen & ink sketches and watercolour studies based on the same location. At least about 40 pieces were sold in 2 group shows with "White Canvas" which is now a private gallery renamed as "Black Gallery" - managed by Colin and Maria who are the owners too. The group shows were held in 2010 and 2011, and those were the years when USK Singapore Chapter grew exponentially.
Tiong Bahru has been a favourite location for me to sketch and paint. The reason is very simple. The buildings are unique and the place is quiet. The morning breakfast crowd dissipates by 10am. The lunch crowd would arrive by 12pm but they usually congregate within the food center. In recent years, there have been many cafes and pubs opening in Tiong Bahru, but these have simmered down in the last 2 years, so Tiong Bahru has more or less become what was before when I first came to know the place.
So far I have mostly used pen & ink, and watercolour for Tiong Bahru. I have not done acrylics or oil yet. It would be a challenge and I am still looking forward to a plein air session at this location.
Anyway drawing and painting the same subject or location can be quite refreshing every time. You may visit the location at different time of day like what Monet did. I can vouch that it would be different all the time. If not you could try a different point of view, which I did all the time. Similarly you may use a different method to draw and paint, or create a series with different colour temperature or colour scheme. I like to change how I frame or format my sketches. This time I used the foreground foliage as a vignette for composition, though I wasn't really thinking of visual path and movement within the image, but I did think about using the darks for creating rhythm. And instead of watercolour, I change my painting medium to coloured pencils.
Hope these would offer you some tips on how you could approach a subject matter for location sketching. :D
Drawing with a Sailor FUDE Calligraphy Fountain Pen - Don Low
Recently in the month of July, I bought a Sailor calligraphy fountain pen at $20 plus from Straits Commercial, after I found out that a favourite artist of mine uses Sailor too. It comes with 4 cartridges with black waterproof ink so it is a pen quite suitable for location drawing. You can replace the cartridge with ease on the go. However I prefer to use a converter so I can use my own ink for the pen. Fortunately another friend (Maria Regina) found it at Tokyu Hands and she kindly bought one for me. I was elated of course. So far I have been syringing my ink or eye dropping my own ink into a used cartridge. Not a difficult process though but the converter still comes in handy. The converter fits quite nicely into the section of the pen.
Ever since I bought the Sailor, I have been using it more than my work horse, a Hero fountain pen. I have been carrying several Hero fountain pens in my bag; 918, M86 and 578... all of them offer the kind of line varieties that I want on my drawings. They are all different though and offer different line characteristics.
Sailor however, (I am not saying it is better) weighs less and it gives every kind of lines I want, including very thin lines. Most importantly, even when I draw very very fast, the lines do not skip, or do not have the tendency to skip. It draws immediately after uncapping and requires no priming. I guess the screw cap prevents the ink from drying on the feed and nib. I like it that it has a long pen body. I reckon I could change a different handling method to draw differently too. Here are some drawings I did with a single Sailor pen.
I need to also mention that different paper surface affects the line quality too. Sizing of the paper types changes the absorbency of ink as well as paper texture. So it is fun to experiment.
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| Monologue Sketchbook - Conklin flex pen |
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| Manga Pad |
Its a Comic Pad from Maxon, and I am testing all my fountain pens with it. Next I will be using my dip pens with it, and indian ink.
My favourite place to visit - Straits Co - where tools and materials and paints become candies to me. Even if I am not buying anything, gossiping about the art industry with the owners of the store is a lot more fun.
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| Sketched with Dili flex fountain pen on my NUDE journal book |
Sketching my wife while she was texting her friends... I decided to abandon my desk and sketch in the bed... while watching Kungfu Panda on TV.
Old doodles done in 2009... not too long ago...
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| pen & ink on cartridge paper |
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| pen & ink on cartridge paper |
My favorite animals in the zoo... I have not seen a hippo in the Singapore zoo yet.
