Here are a few things we found in Grenham bay in June. Nemo is enjoying the bays a lot more with the nicer weather! To see our findings in more detail check out my beach findy blog at Nemo by Sea.
June Findings on the Bay
Little Wolf Head
An author friend has asked me to illustrate her new novel about wolves, so here is a draft practicing a wolf with a bit of an expression. She’s an A5 watercolour painted mostly in yellow watercolour, grey Brusho and Indian ink.
Cuttlebones and other Curios in May
Here are some other interesting finds around the coast in May, for more sea stuff check out my other blog Nemo by Sea.
Eastern Newt
I was commissioned by an art lover from Ohio to this eastern newt in its ‘red eft’ stage. I was really pleased with this commission as any excuse to splash orange around makes me very happy!
The orange colour is only restricted to the juvenile stage of the newt’s life and when it ages up in a couple of years becomes a greenish, brown or olive colour but keeps its red spots.
I painted these newts on one of my favourite ‘snowy surfaced’ watercolour paper, with its cotton like, fluffy texture. I added crêpe paper for even more texture which creases and traps Brusho pigment in interesting ways.
Since I always make alternate versions when commissioned, the vertical oriented newt is available in my shop.
Bold Jumping Spider
This is a little, fuzzy jumping spider I decided to paint this after watching a documentary on how cute and expressive these guys are. This painting is about 180mm across, small, but not as minuscule as a real jumping spider (8-11mm) and painted on hot pressed watercolour paper, Indian ink and Brusho.
This bold jumping spider is hanging out in my shop, I hope to make a series of spiders, each with a crazy vibrant colour scheme. If I find any orange ones, I’ll be in my element!
Drafting up a Newt Painting
This was one of my first draft paintings for a commission, it’s a little rough round the edges but it helped me decide what I was going to do with the background around this little newt here. In the final version I decided to simplify the background and not build it up so much into huge saturated clouds of colour.
I also had some buckling issues and finally learned how to solve all buckling by using glass sheets as a press instead of the wooden blocks I was using before. The glass kept the painting wet for a lot longer allowing for the moisture to permeate much more slowly throughout the paper making for much flatter results.
Shells we found in April
Here’s a few things that me and Nemo stumbled across on our walks together in April, for more details about them, visit my coastal blog Nemo by Sea.
Polar Bear
Another little A5 bear, this one painted on cold pressed watercolour paper. The grey and darker tones were made with a fineliner, all other colours were just regular old watercolour pans with some Indian ink splodges of course.
Brown Bear on Yupo
This is a simple little brown bear painted on Yupo paper, I’ve wanted to paint bears for ages so this sweet, tiny one is a good place to start. I had to use a lot of white pigment to draw the fur back in as adding water to dry, glassy paint removes all the layering in unpredictable ways.
Scruffy Mallard
This scruffy little mallard was painted in Brusho and watercolour, I’m not sure if I’m done with the little guy yet, but I thought I’d post him just in case he gets thrown in recycling to join all his older brothers.
Nemo by Sea February 2020 Teaser
We managed to find some interesting things in Grenham Bay despite the UK’s battering from the recent winter storms, including a slipper limpet! For more information check us out on the Nemo by Sea Patreon blog.
Alcohol Inks Experimentation
I’ve been so inspired by the abstract work other artists make with Yupo, I thought I’d experiment a little on some well used, scrappy Yupo I had lying around.
On the right side of the paper I used a hairdryer to blow out the alcohol inks with large puddles of isopropyl and you can achieve lovely sheets of blending translucent colour. In the bottom left side, I let the alcohol ink dry then added spots of isopropyl which I then blew outward with a straw.
I wondered if I could marry watercolour and the alcohol inks, and cobble something together which could look pretty seamless. On a whim I drew out a seahorse onto the dry alcohol inks in a Copic Multiliner SP, which was the only pen out of twelve different brands I tried which faired decently once isopropyl and water is thrown at it. I then painted her with watercolours, and beefed her out with Indian ink once dry.
Yupo Fox
I haven’t really played around with Yupo with watercolours since 2016, and I really want to experiment a little more with it.
I used a ball point pen and pencil for the underlying drawing, watercolour and finished off with Indian ink. It’s a bit of a fight finding pens which stay on the paper even with light pressure from brushes. None of my fineliners were up to it, which is unfortunate as I think ball points have such ugly lines.
Gel pens were also out of the question for detail because of the tacky way the paint dries, so in the end he was saved by some paint pens which I used for the white accents and now waits in my shop for a new home.
Yupo Goose
I found kinship with this hissy goose on an angry day I was having, so I decided to paint it out. I couldn’t quite believe how many ‘teeth’ they have, even along the tongue which is fun and terrifying.
I have less of an attention span of a goose at times, so I had forgotten how exactly to work on this interesting plastic paper so had to learn all over again.
Firstly I used a ball point pen to draw the image out, which I then went over with a Staedtler permanent Lumocolour pen to go over those lines. I then used Indian ink to flesh out the drawing a little more and give the goose some more character.
After the Yupo was dry I used watercolour for the eyes and the beak, then used alcohol inks for the rest of the image, using isopropyl alcohol to split the inks and clean spirit to completely wipe colour off the paper entirely.
I used a 4B pencil to help me shade in a few areas and to create some scratchiness and after it was all dry went in with white pigment and white spirit to add some details and contrast.
Nemo by Sea January 2020 Teaser
I’m still scouring the beaches in the increasingly colder weather to paint and draw odd things in my local bay. January’s fruits included an actual spine wrapped in the seaweed, a mystery animal spine, more information about that and other interesting finds on my Nemo by Sea Patreon blog.
Small Foxy Inkings
Just a couple of fox inkings I’m working on, these are small A5 foxes on different weight papers. Funnily enough I used the same drawing to transfer the images using the light box, but they look quite different. I’m really looking forward to seeing how they turn out once painted.
Nemo by Sea December 2019 Teaser
It’s great to be back in the rhythm of weekly posting and not agonising too much over ‘are the eyes right?’. Here’s a glimpse of some of the good stuff I have posted on my Nemo by Sea Patreon blog this month.
Nemo by Sea Project Announcement
This is a new personal project I’m embarking on where me and my senior dog Nemo actually go outside to see what the local bays have to draw, paint and journal.
What’s different about this project is that other than it being different subject matter, is that I have some neat little rewards at various price points if people choose to support me, if not, it’s just loads of free coastal art to enjoy!
If you’re interested in this idea and want to support me further, please visit me on Patreon. ➤
Cat Scribbles for my Sibling
My sister has been abroad for many years but is coming back to the United Kingdom soon, sadly though having to leave her two scrappy street cats she adopted in Mexico behind for a while.
I thought I’d illustrate her two substitute children as a surprise to tide her over.
I used a variety of different materials to create these paintings, I found that using charcoal and pastel over a watercolour painting created some really great fur texture, along with scribblings of white pen.
Funnily enough, the ‘cuddling’ cats picture was saved from the ‘crap pile’ by my mum, and without her intervention, they would be lost.
I often discard work through pure emotion, as I get easily frustrated if things don’t turn out the way I’d hoped. My mum insists on going through all my recent painting fails when she visits (nosy!), dragged the pair out and made me resee the potential, so I worked on them some more, and now I’m really happy with the result and, more importantly so is my sister — thanks mum!
House Flies
I’m not a fan of summer, it’s hot and there are flies and that’s enough for me to wish for eternal winters, but for those who long for the summer, here’s a reminder to not wish the year away just yet …
Flies are actually quite beautiful up close and I’ve always wanted to paint them. I chose hot pressed watercolour paper this time, I thought the shiny bodies lent itself to a less textural paper, with some crêpe paper for the wings.
