Shoot it, Sketch it: Black bird

| Anna Cull
Black bird on a grey day – ink and watercolour, 125 x 170 mm, 2012

Here is my second sketch for Shoot it, Sketch it — take a photo of something and then sketch, draw or paint it. The initial sketch was done with dip pen and ink. The watercolour background (something I painted for another project last year) was added in Photoshop.

The photo (below) was taken on a grey, spring day when I spotted this little bird on a tree outside my studio window. It was taken in a hurry, through the less-than-spotlessly-clean window, but was still good enough to use as a reference. Something about the silhouette appealed to me and I thought it would be fun to draw — and it was.

original photo
original sketch

Check out what Bec from Clouds of Colour and Alana from The Little Leaf have done this week too. They’re the bloggers who introduced the Shoot it, Sketch it feature.

Beautiful Blogger Award

| Anna Cull

Imagine my surprise! Mary from The Backdoor Artist has nominated me for a Beautiful Blogger Award. Thank you, Mary!

The Rules A Few Guidelines:

  1. Thank the person who nominated you — tick.
  2. Post the award image to your page — tick.
  3. Tell seven facts about yourself — keep reading…
  4. Nominate 15* other bloggers for the award and let them know about the nomination.

*Some blogs suggest nominating seven other bloggers for the BBA and that’s the option I’ve decided to go with — not because I can’t think of 15 worthy nominees (I can think of way more than 15…) but because I like the number seven.

Seven Facts About Me:

  • I met my husband in a band (I was singing and he was playing guitar).
  • We will be celebrating our 19th wedding anniversary next week.
  • We still sing together at open mic nights (and occasionally elsewhere).
  • I write songs.
  • Some of the songs I’ve written are rubbish.
  • Some of the songs I’ve written are not rubbish.
  • The last song I sang at open mic was Kate Bush’s Wuthering Heights (yes, in the original key). Having done that, I’m now fearless — at least until next week.

Seven Beautiful Bloggers:

Thanks again to Mary for nominating me. To hear that I’m an inspiration… well… I was lost for words for a couple of days. And that’s unusual for me : )  Another seed planted.

Shoot it, Sketch it: Blue door

| Anna Cull

Blue door – ink and watercolour, 220 x 205 mm, 2012.

Bec from Clouds of Colour and Alana from The Little Leaf started a new feature on their blogs this week. It’s called Shoot it, Sketch it. The idea is that you take a photo of something and then you sketch, draw or paint it. Just for fun. And I’m joining in…

Here’s my first offering. The reference photo (below) is not great quality — it was taken on my nothing-special Nokia phone which I carry everywhere mainly so that I can collect images for drawing and painting (such as this door) when I don’t have my camera with me. It’s quite handy as a phone too ; )

Out of the blue

| Anna Cull

Seagull #1 – acrylic on card, 210 x 297 mm, 2012.

I’ve been spending a bit of time on digital illustrations lately and felt the need to get back to something altogether more analogue. So I spent an hour messing about with acrylics…

Whether it’s good, bad or mediocre — if I don’t create it, nobody else will.