Learning To Sketching Rabbits

Posted on March 11, 2019 by Larry Marshall

I recently posted a sketch of a rabbit skeleton and talked about drawing Beatrix Potter rabbits and then sketching my way to wanting to understand their insides. I was asked “Where are the other sketches?”

Truth is, they were in my garbage can, where most of my “let’s try this” doodles end up. I dug through the can and found a couple of the sheets with rabbits on them and, with some embarrassment, I’ll show them to you. Laugh if you like. I don’t mind.

These sheets are cheap card stock from Staples and so they don’t take watercolor well at all but I have such sheets sitting next to my computer and I’m always doodling something.

Some feeble attempts at drawing stuff from Beatrix Potter’s Peter Rabbit book.

This hodge-podge of scribbles is typical of my doodle sheets. This one contains some feeble attempts at rabbits.

I thought I should include a serious, though not entirely successful, attempt at a rabbit just to redeem myself somewhat. I think she’s cute.

The Loss Behind The Loss Is The Problem

Posted on September 29, 2017 by Larry Marshall

Ha…sometimes my misplaced optimism goes on display and it’s embarrassing. In the last couple posts I talked about “my loss” as in an inability to walk to sketching sites like I normally do. I rambled about how this would be an opportunity to try new things, do experiments, etc. Ha!

In the past week or so I’ve learned that my real loss has been any interest in doing anything, and to some degree a lack of ability to do anything. When you’re in constant pain, constantly worried about your health, and losing sleep because of both, it’s hard to muster either ability or interest in doing things, even things you love. Such has been my situation recently.

So…I haven’t done any grand sketching experiments. I haven’t experimented with gouache as I said I might. I haven’t done much of anything in fact except talk to doctors. Things are improving, however. Now I can walk all the way to the kitchen (grin).

So, all I have to show you are some small doodles that I’ve done while watching TV ad nauseam. I apologize for the lack of blog posts. One thing, though, is that these doodles are more loose than my typical street sketch and while I’m sure they’re inspired from somewhere, the subjects just fell out of my head when I took pen in hand. Maybe I can call these “experiments.”

Urban Sketcher Boredom As He Awaits Spring

Posted on March 9, 2016 by Larry Marshall

Have you ever wondered if bears open an eye, look out of their den at the snow and wish that spring would arrive because their stomach is growling? Naw…me neither but that’s how I feel right now.

Our winter has been relatively mild but from the view of this urban sketcher, it’s been very long. Sure, I’ve been going to the museum to sketch but a good portion of the fun of sketching for me is wandering around, looking for something interesting to sketch. I’ve got the darn museum memorized; there are no surprises.

It’s times like this that I wish I liked to sketch from photos, but I don’t. So, for the most part, I’m a bored urban sketcher, doodling just to keep my hand moving. I thought I’d share a few pages of doodles with you. These were all done in a 4×6 Stillman & Birn Alpha series softcover.

As you can see, it’s a melange of tiny sketches, some ear practice and some hatching scribbles thrown in for good measure. Sometimes I’ll fill a whole page with circles or bad ellipses. I do a lot of this stuff on photocopy paper and when sheets are filled they are wadded up and thrown in the garbage. Just for giggles, here is one of those sheets. Sorry for the wrinkles. It was pulled from my garbage can (grin). I also apologize that some of the sketching is upside down. I don’t pay much attention to that when I’m filling these pages since my garbage can isn’t particular. Do you do this sort of thing or am I the only one? I bet I’m the only one dumb enough to share them.