Iceland Sketchbook

All ready (at least the sketchbook is ready) for the Iceland trip.

I searched through pretty much every sketchbook at Wet Paint to find one that both had suitable watercolor sketching paper, but also a good printable cover and came up with this Hand Book sketchbook by global art materials. Not perfect, but pretty close for now. My ideal sketchbook would allow for flat full spreads (which this one does), have hot pressed watercolor paper (can't find a single sketchbook that has this), and have a good screen printable cover (which this has).  I'll admit the linen cover made me a bit nervous, but after securing the book in place and four passes of ink, the image still came out quite clear.

No new sketchbook would be complete without color guides! Admittedly, in addition to the new sketchbook I also purchased a set of 12 Holbein Watercolors, which I am planning on taking with. Thus, doing double duty, this also made for a good reason to test out mixing some colors, and trying out the paper in this book.

Back at screen printing, here is a quick run-down of the process... Above is the vector silhouette of the country of Iceland that I drew in Adobe Illustrator, printed on acetate film, and exposed.

With a fully exposed, washed, and dried screen and this set up I was ready to print. 

Because of the thickness of the sketchbook, and the normal depth that using clamps allows, we added an extra piece of wood between the table and where the clamps are attached.  Of course, then a bit more support is also needed for the bottom of the screen as well. I only had one chance to get this print "right," otherwise I'd have to buy another sketchbook, so I taped down some guides to hold the book in place while I pressed the ink through the screen. Since it took four passes to get the complete image, it's a good thing the book stayed in place!

Mixing Colors - Part 1

Lately, I've been working with water color crayons a lot. It's turned into an addiction that I do intend to let go of at some point. For the time being though they are easily affordable, a good quality, come in a variety of fun colors, oh so easy to transport, and don't make a big watery mess that can result from typical watercolors. Like many things, the more you play with them, the more possibilities you discover to do with them.  In this case, I've been mixing every possible color that I own together to see what other kind of colors I can possibly come up with by using what I already have.

The colors along the top and the left side are the ones that I am starting with, and when you add them together the intersecting square is the color you get. Granted, this is by no means a perfect science, but it has definitely been giving me a great idea of how and where to start from in terms of thinking of a color palate, or trying to mix the perfect brown.

Many of the colors do seem quite similar when mixed together, though I do have to say that thus far, I think my new favorites are the neutrals that I get from burnt sienna mixed with a yellowish/ochre color, or anything mixed with gold. I never guessed that I would be using the color gold as much as I have. Saturation also seems to have a lot to do with the strength or intensity of the color. These, for example, are all quite watered down, as I put the pigment on the paper first, and then applied the water to mix the colors together. Had I pressed much harder with the crayons, or applied less water I do think they might have turned out more intense.