Transcripts
1. Introduction: I'm Chris Carter, and I'm thrilled to be able
to offer you now the updated version of my
sketch series online course. In the original course, I presented three series, the series of Broken Trumpet
Parts, Glass, Inkwells. I'm family Treasures. In this updated course, I am including additional series such as the hickory Nut Husks, fountain Pens, cafes, Pubs
and Restaurants, and plants. The series that you make, you may have already started. You might go through
your Sketchbooks. What was it that you drew? Lot of. What was it that you
enjoyed drawing the most? You might already have
2030 sketches of bottles. Let's say. You could have that the
beginning of your series. That's perfectly okay. And as your project, if you want to post three of those that you've
already created, That's fine with me. It's recognizing that
you have a series going and then moving
forward to it, committing, committing to
that hundred sketches. So in each of the videos that I'm presenting
in this course, I narrate the videos pointing
out different aspects of how you can benefit from your series approaches
to your series. Choices for what
you're series may be. I'll talk about how choosing one topic or object or place, you can focus on other things
like techniques, design, your style, color mixing, color schemes, grayscale values. You'll see a great variety of techniques and styles in the examples that
I'm showing you, I think you'll enjoy this class. I'm giving you
permission to make up your own set of rules
around your series. And that can change
partway through, doesn't matter how long it takes you to
complete the series, through your series and
through reviewing your series, which is an important part of
learning from your series. From that, you learn
a lot about who you are as an artist and where
are you may want to be going. It could be a direction
that's completely different from what you imagine. And allow yourself to
go in that direction, at least in your sketchbook. Give yourself a little nudge to find out what
else you can do. You might be surprised. I'm Chris Carter.
Welcome to the course.
3. Broken Trumpet Parts: This is the box of broken trumpet parts that
I found at a garage sale. This is a drawing I did first and ink I followed
with watercolor. This is a squiggle drawing. To create a squiggle drawing, I use a very fine
nib fountain pen. I move around and around
and around and around in circle and build
up the values. It reminds me of working in a dark room when
you see the values, the darks come to life. This is another sketch
where I drew it first in a fountain pen using a
contour line drawing of sorts. And then I painted it
in with watercolor. Now for these two, I used a combination
of fountain pen, and I used ink using a brush. I used a dip pen and purple ink. I followed by putting in
the values using marker. Here was just ink contour line. When exploring color, I decided
that I really wanted to understand the natural
value of different colors. So I would take a photograph of the sketch and turn it into black and white and I
really learned a lot. The image on the left
is an oil painting. I wanted to try something different with my Trumpet Parts, and I was in the middle of working on a large oil painting. So I took a break and
I made this sketch. The one on the right is a combination of ink,
watercolor and gouache. This trumpet is painted
with an ink brush pen. Here I used the ink brush
pen and added Watercolor. The one on the left is a
combination of watercolor, ink and splattered gouache. The image on the right is another technique that I love to use when I'm working
with a fountain pen. And I wanted to put in values, I'll often use parallel
lines to create the values. Here you can see that
I've started to add other elements to the
trumpet parts after a while. And you get a little bit tired
of drawing the same parts. You can always add
plants to your sketches. You can see I'm a bit
more playful here, looser with the ink drawing and dabbing on the watercolor. Another element entered
into a lot of my series was the little brass animals that I found at a flea market. In this case, it's
the little lizard. This is one where I experienced a great
deal of frustration. I did two versions, didn't like either one. So I ripped them both up and
made a collage out of them. So that's what you
see on the right. It's the collage of the
previous two sketches. Both of these are
ink and marker. This case, I'm using
a water soluble ink. I often will use either
the new dollars black or the Platinum Carbon ink
and those will not bleed. I also enjoy using ink that
bleeds because it gives us very evocative expressive mark. In February, there aren't very many plants blooming
outside in New Jersey. So I turned to my oxalic plants that are my favorite plant. And I used them a
lot in my drawings. Here we have two very
different approaches are both ink and watercolor, but you can see that the one on the left is very
loosely applied. The watercolor that is, and some experimental
colors for the shadows. The one on the right is not handled this loosely
with the Watercolor. Notice that I play with the shadows and the
color of the shadows. At this point, I'm really enjoying exploring
color schemes, limiting myself to
certain colors, which means that I'm not
working with reality at all. I'm being playful with my color. And what Fun shapes you can find when you play with shadows. This is another
pretty messy one. The one on the left, you can see different
variations of values. I have changed the value
of the chair in the back. I thought it was just
far too chaotic. I still think it's
far too chaotic, but it was kinda Fun to do. I learned a lot from
the one on the right is the same colors just
handled bit differently. Notice that the position of the trumpet
parts is the same. There you see my little
brass lizard again, my favorite trumpet part
and a bit of plants, eucalyptus, here's my
favorite little guy. I took him everywhere
with me when I traveled so that I could do
sketches as I went. Another example of a
very tight approach on the left and a loose
approach on the right. The color just gets more and more exciting as I went through this series and doing this
pretty much on a daily basis, I learned so much
about color and I just expanded it more
and more and more. And it really helped when I was getting a little bit
bored with my subject. You can get pretty bored at about 30 and then you have to start experimenting
more and more. You play with color. And the next day, you look forward to it again. You can see my little
trumpet part again, I didn't get around
to painting this in It wasn't a very
thin paper notebook. Daffodil, trumpet and
my little brass lizard. Here we add a little
closer to spring. So I'm bringing my rosemary
and I love drawing plants and it made it a little bit easier to get
through the series. This is a real play
with the cells. I really encourage you to try this technique of
drawing in rectangles. First rectangle squares
overlapping each other, and then placing your
subject inside of them. Zoom in on it, zoom
out on, it's very Fun. Look at how striking the shadow is on the one on the right, the shadow is as much a
shape as the object itself. And the patterns on
the left are made even livelier with the
intensity of the color. The looseness in
the background on the left was really Fun. The one on the right
is delightfully loose. Now this one, I used a dip pen, I scribbled it out in a burgundy ink and plot
some watercolor on it. And it really like it. I was in a much better
mood after I finished it. Here we have the
line drawing before I added the color
and then the color, a very loose dip
pen and watercolor. Here's my little lizard again, very simple and basic. And there's my little
guy, my Trumpet guy. At this point, I was
playing with geometry and patterns and buildings. I decided to present my Trumpet Part as an
architectural rendering of sorts. I began playing with
see-through images. And on the right are
fantastic salt and pepper shakers where
I had a lot of time. I just worked very slowly
creating those lines. Another landscape in Maryland
with my little trumpet guy, and there's a salt
and pepper shaker. And color It's laminated
wood, all different colors, food laminated together and then carved into this pepper grinder. I hear you can see that graduation in a
pulled puddle wash, where I'm changing
the color within the shape and the trumpet
part in the front, the yellow, it goes
from yellow to oranges. And in the back it goes from yellows into blue,
greens and blues. And then the ink,
which is a green ink, is bleeding through all of
it and I really do like it. You can see the bleeds from blue into lavender in this also, I let the blue ink
bleed into it's a turquoise ink and it really made nice color with
the lavender paint. I was adding Another
careful drawing, and then I added a
beautiful green shadow to it and I love it. The trumpet parts or
a little camouflaged and getting to be spring
peas were coming up. I loved playing with the
shapes and the negative space, leaving the P shapes white. I'm using my series to
explore the rest of the world to Fun colors with
rosemary and trumpet parts. I was commissioned to
do drawings of dice, and they were still
out on the table when I did my sketch that day, some Fun colors and patterns. That's the cap. And there's my
very last drawing. When it was all done, I donated the box of trumpet parts
to a local prop shop.
4. Family Treasures: Of all the series I've done, my family Treasures
series is my favorite. It's an ongoing series. I realized after I was
only a little way through, add that to create
sketches that can replace stuff is very valuable. I wanted to create
these sketches, not just the stuff
from my own childhood, but also from stuff from
my children's childhood. There. Thanks for my own
children's childhood that I would love to keep because
I like to see them. I remember those times that we had the funny ventures
that we had together. As a result, my house getting to be just
overrun with stuff, stuff that should
be thrown out to create these drawings that bring back the memories
just as well as the stuff is lot
better if an idea, I think the idea of compressing a household of stuff into 123, maybe four volumes
of Sketchbooks. Think is marvelous. In addition, you
can make copies of those drawings and
paintings and print them out or make other books. It's an ideal way to share memories with your family
and your loved ones. We found a box that had
tiny little animals in it that had been my
mother's her collection when she was a child. My dad's tools were always
an inspiration to me. Were the kitchen, the
kitchen thermometer. Every winter when we
made popcorn balls, we use that thermometer. Memory after memory
after memory. Look around your house and find the things that bring
back the best stories. And maybe start with those
5. Glass Inkwells: The Glass Inkwells are another find from the
local flea market. There 12 of these
really wonderful, thick blue off blue, very pale blue glass Inkwells. So I started another series of 100 sketches with
the Inkwells and I played the color scheme
game quite a bit with these here we have the
analogous with one complement, the dominant being
the orange, yellow. And I would draw
it in first with a fountain pen and ink and
then lay the washes down. This is Reeves PFK
printmaking paper. You can see on this one
that I also allowed for the bottles to be
outside of the cell. Same with this, I plan to head. In fact, what I may have
done is I may have drawn the Inkwells first and then
drew the cell around them. I did do that on occasion. This looks like I used a dip pen instead
of a fountain pen. More Glass Inkwells, analogous with one complement I was playing the
color scheme game. Series are fantastic for
playing the color scheme game. And really learning about color value and
color combinations. In the series of Glass Inkwells, I was looser with my line. I was looser with the dip
pen, the fountain pen. And I was also a
bit looser and a little more free with the
way that I used watercolor. My focus in this series
was more on playing with color schemes and
also Composition design. I played with the shapes of the lights and the
shapes of the darks. I also explored the ink brush, pen a little bit more, trying it on different
surfaces paper. One of the focuses of my other work was on
clarifying values, making good use of
lights and darks. I ended up doing quite a few monochromatic studies
and my Inkwells. One little oil paint
sketch slipped in more Glass Inkwells. And this started
another new approach to the series and to just
change things out a little bit. I hid the Glass
Inkwells back there. And the last sketch in this
sketchbook is the Inkwells. Totally hidden. We see just the shadow. So I play around
with these things. It's been, I'm learning
something along the way. I learned about design and
learn about composition, color, and just playfulness. I hope that the examples
I've shared with you in the Trumpet series, Family Treasures and the Glass Inkwells will inspire
you to look around your house and find your own special objects
to turn into a series
6. Fountain Pens & Dip Pens: Often I end up
with a series when I didn't intend to
create it as the series. Always sifting through files, looking for examples
that I can use and workshops and on online courses, how will find that? I've created enormous amount
of sketches on, for example, insects or scissors, or in this case, fountain pens. I put these together
because they are a series and I'm astounded at how many sketches I've done of a certain items and how many different ways I've
approached it and used it. Now the fountain pen is
something that creeps into so many of my sketches because I'm normally
using a fountain pen. So maybe it's just
the cap that ends up in a sketch because
it's next to the glass. When I'm sitting in a cafe
and I'm sketching the glass, and I end up sketching
the fountain pen cap to. I've also included Dip
Pens in this series. This drawing, I'm
using a water brush. Here is a pencil sketch. You'll see there just so many ways that it can
end up in a sketch. In this collection of Sketches, you'll also recognize that I'm playing with color schemes. Perhaps you'll
start to recognize that some of the
color schemes I use, playing with color schemes
design where I'm using my cells to create different
shapes to draw into. And once again, I'm
showing examples of how I bend the world
into my dollar Art. Sometimes I just play
with my fountain Pens
7. Hickory Nut Husks: The hickory Nut Husks series, I originally called
Walmart Husks. I thought they were from
our black walnut tree. I really do know the difference between walnuts
and hickory nuts, but I don't have a
hickory Nut Tree. And when I found all of these
Nut Husks in the woodshed, I immediately thought, oh, wow, they're there,
the wall Nut Husks. And of course they weren't. They were from my neighbors, hickory Nut Tree that the squirrels had brought
into the woodshed. I've renamed this the
hickory Nut Husks series. This was specifically a
series just on the Husks. This was created for the 100-day project that
I participated in online. And in many ways, this was one of my most challenging challenges because it was one simple thing. Yes, I had a pile of these Husks and they all had
slight differences to them. I still found myself
wondering how I was going to come up with
100 different ways to look at these Husks. And what I did was I really took advantage of the opportunity to work in One sketch book
which I created myself. It's a Coptic bound
sketchbook that I made from old recycled file folders
and pen to flex folders. So it's a nice surface to work
in with ink and watercolor and also with Posca pen and Craig paw and markers
and all kinds of things. So I just let myself run free with what I could
do with different media. I just would get super loose on some and super tight on others. I dug through my
supplies to pull out tools that I had
not used for years. Also paints I hadn't
used for years, inks. During this time, I started making my own inks
because they'd been making dyes for
fabric from forage plants. And I decide, well, I'm going to use those also to make dyes and
make my watercolors. So those are also
in this series. And I went back to playing with the viva watercolor pages. And those are pieces of paper have intense
pigment on them. And you just, just see, you either use a regular
brush dipped into water or a water brush, and just pick up the pigment
from the piece of paper. I also forced myself to play more with a
portable ink brush. I went back to using gouache, which I absolutely love and had been meaning to get back
to and really hadn't. So I dug out all my old gouache
and that was really Fun. I always loved doing
squiggle drawings. I went back to that. I hadn't done them
in a long time. Crackpot is another medium that I loved in
the distant past. And I dug those out and
had a good time with them. Silver point was something
that I picked up, hadn't played with that much. And I went back and
experimented with that. Some of these methods are really fast and some of them are slow. I mixed a lot of media. I played with ink bleeds, just adding clear water
to the ink lines, allowing the ink to either
bleed into water puddles or to bring water puddles up against a line
to make it bleed. I experimented with
mixing a little bit of white gouache in with my
inks and watching how the variation in
viscosity caused a different kind of bleed and movement of the ink and gouache. Now some of the inks and paints that I make are not light fast. That to me, it doesn't matter when I'm working
in a sketch book. I still learn so
much about handling materials and what
the results are. Some experiments I thought were successful and others
certainly weren't. I learned a lot from both
the successful ones, the ones I didn't
like very much. A course, my drawing
skills continued to be honed and design. How wet or dry a
surface needs to be. How does the paint or
ink respond when added into a very wet area of paint
or a dry area of paint. And at what point do
you want to add it? Do you want to let the surface
dry a bit more or do you want to drop something into
it while it's still very wet? I'm very happy that I
made notes of what tools I used and what media I used in each of the drawings because I definitely would
not have remembered and I would not have
been able to tell from some of the sketches
what I'd used. One of the big
surprises was that with the black ink
that I made myself, I believe I had
used a bit of iron mordant that I made
from rusty nails. When the ink dried, it ended up to appear
a little metallic. There was bit of a
glittery effect to it, which I really liked. And I noticed that in
some of my other inks to after they sat of while
and maybe try to while. That's something that
I'm now exploring further in how to add that
to some of the paints. Not for a lot of sparkle, but just a hint. It's really beautiful. Makes such a difference
whether you pull into the puddle or you
pull out of the puddle. Whether you go right up to an edge or if you
cross over an edge. And if you draw into a puddle. There are a lot of
Pens I hadn't used for a long time with
different kinds of nibs. And I played with those again. By the time I got to day 40, I was beginning to really
tire of the Husks. And I started to play with collage and I started to
be a bit more abstract. Of course I returned to
drawing other ways to, you'll see some dollar Art where I played the
color scheme game. The sketches for created on
raves, PFK printmaking paper. They're not in the
sketch book created from the file folders and folders
8. Plants: Nature provides the opportunity to explore shapes, colors, patterns, color combinations, movement, symmetry, asymmetry. It includes information
for an artist to hone every possible skill
necessary in your practice. I take advantage of drawing plants because I can
play with color. I can observe how
color changes as the quality of the light
of the sun changes, as the color of the sky changes. And that informs me, it informs me about
how I want to choose Color when I'm working on planner painting
or studio painting, or meditative painting, I
experimented with value. Lights against darks,
darks against lights. I experimented a lot with
temperature of color. Warm greens. Against cool greens. I'm able to investigate
how a plant grows. What I've sketched a plant, I learn what the shape
of the leaves are. I learn the pattern
growth of the plant. And if I need a leaf
in a certain place, because the composition
and design, would it be improved
because of that, I can invent a leaf that looks like it
belongs on that plan. And that's a really, really
valuable lesson to learn because you can apply that in all other aspects of your work. You'll also notice that I
experiment with design. I've learned so much about designing shapes
within a square, within a rectangle,
within a page. And I can play with that
design just by adding a leaf wherever I wanted
her a stem that will be appropriate
to that plant. I learned how empty space
works with cluttered space and how an empty space can balance an area of
intense patterning. You'll also notice in
the plant series that I'm experimenting with
charging the puddle. And I refer to the
puddle and other courses when I make a beautiful
transition from, let's say, a blue into
a green on a leaf. And the transition is seamless. You'll see a lot
of that practice. Look at the individual leaves and you'll see what
I've done there. If I were to choose only one series to work on for the rest of my life,
it would be plants. Fortunately, I don't have
to live with myself.
9. Food & Kitchen Stuff: In this series, I focused on examples of food
and Kitchen Stuff. This grouping can also
be narrowed down. You might focus on just
food or just Kitchen ions, maybe just appliances, or perhaps only silverware
that can be broken down. Maybe you just want
to focus on spoons. Forks. You might focus on the
ingredients for food. You'll see that I
also focused on exploring color schemes by playing the color scheme thing. And also after having played
color scheme game and I just focused on color schemes without dictating to myself what color
scheme I was going to use. I try different techniques. I sketched over
abandoned paintings. I sketch during all times of the day and all
times of the night. I sketched in
different states of wakefulness and different
states of sleeplessness. I experimented with drawing
fast and drawing slowly, as well as Painting fast
and painting slowly. I honed my skills on other techniques like
pulling the puddle, contour, line
drawing, stippling. I used a lot of different tools. I used fountain pen, dip pen. I use permanent ink. I used ink that would bleed. I used ink with the dip pen, and I used ink with a brush. I played with design. I experimented with bending
my world into $1 design. That dollar is the circular
shape that I used, that I've divided into
smaller shapes using a swooping line in a similar
way to make them tangles. Now granted, this is not a, a quick morning scribble. I've already spent
about 15 min as it was closer to 15
min doing the drawing, which is why I like doing
these in the morning. And now my brain has
kicked in and I have expectations of this because I want this Fun experience again. So instead of it
being a surprise, it's an expectation and we'll
see what happens with that. This is where daily
practice comes in because you have
to go through all of these stages of
happy accidents. Oh, I like that. I
wanna do that again. To apprehension over
will it be Fun Again? Will it work again? And then you get to the
point for your relaxed, it becomes part of your habit, becomes part of your
intuitive mark-making. And then you proceed
from there and you end up with another
happy accident. It all starts all over again.
10. Cafés, Pubs & Restaurants: A series can be based
on places you go. Could be museums, libraries, diners, parks, train stations, coffee shops, hairdressers,
parking lots, schoolyards, any
number of places. And it can be places
that you frequent often. For example, I can be
specific museums or a specific coffee shops it might be looking in, are looking out. And what I've done in this
series is I'm presenting some sketches that I've done in cafes, Pubs, and Restaurants. I traveled quite often. Most often, I'm eating alone. I have a lot of time to sketch. I'm also waiting for my meal, or just enjoying my meal or
enjoying a glass of wine. I have a table in front of me. So it's very easy to take that opportunity to
either be in a spot where I can look out
through a window and sketch what's going
on outside over Cafe. Or especially in Pubs. It's really Fun to sketch what's going on inside of the pub. You have so many choices. You can break down your series
and be far more specific. It could be sketches from eating places or it could
also be from a specific, from a favorite restaurant. Only looking out onto the street or into a park
or whatever the view is, or out onto the beach
or the ocean waves. And it could be also from sitting on a bench
outside of the location. With that location in
your sketch somehow. But maybe for the people
passing by or how the seasons change
around the landscaping, for example, a park. It could be from a
specific bench or could be from numerous benches are
standing up or different areas. It's up to you. Think of the places
that you go most often, or that you like to go
or that you want to go. Think of the places
that you go on a regular basis where
you're having to wait. Maybe a doctor's office, dentist's office or hospital, a school yard where you're going to pick up your children. If that's the case, then every time you
go the cars around, you're gonna be different. The people may be the same that come in and
out of the doors, but they're gonna be in
different arrangements wearing different clothing. Again, different seasons. You don't have to
draw the whole scene. You can draw what you see through the back window of the car parked in front of you. Or you can sketch what's
inside of your own car. Some of your cars may be really messy and you've got
all kinds of things to sketch from inside of
your car that could be a totally
different series to, I'm just suggesting
that you already have endless possibilities for
a series based on place. And there are many
ways to develop that series in any way that
seems appropriate to you. To focus that series on something that would be
Fun for you to explore. You will be amazed
at how quickly you hone your drawing skills, how you expand the way
you look at things, and how you start experimenting
with different media. Just around sketch 30, 40, 50. If you're getting a
little bit bored, force yourself to go all
the way through 100, even if it takes you
a year or two years, it doesn't matter. Just get back to
it at some point, look at what you've
done and move forward. This is not an assignment, this is a suggestion. This is a nudge for you to use the tools you
already have to experiment with them and to just use some of that time that you wouldn't be
sitting there anyway. There are multiple
opportunities throughout your day when you
think you don't have time to sketch,
you absolutely do. Have Fun with it. And I hope you've enjoyed
the samples that I've shared with you in
this short video.
11. Conclusion: Now you've seen examples of several of my series
of 100 sketches. You've seen broken trumpet
parts, Glass, Inkwells, Family Treasures,
hickory Nut Husks, cafes sketches, fountain Pens, sketches of food
and Kitchen items, and sketches of play. I hope that these are giving you an idea of what you might
do with your series. You see there really
are no rules. You can use any
kind of techniques, any kind of materials. And you can change
it out as long as you have one subject
or one theme, one set of objects, and then adapt them
to the world around. You. Have Fun with this. When you've completed three, please post them in the
project section of this class, you may continue
to add images of your series to the project
page as you go along. And there's no time limit. It took me 14 months to
complete the Trumpet series. So don't rush, enjoy it
and expand your horizons. I promised you at the end of
100 paintings and sketches, you will have honed
some of your skills. Thank you for watching and check out some of my other
classes on Skillshare. I'm Chris Carter
Chris Carter, artist, illustrator and explorer
