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Final Days

As everything is coming to the end, I find myself with more to do and even less time. Symposium had been the main project, and I now must create another large piece.  Now that I know what I can to (and how) it should be a little easier at least to do what I need to do.  Seeing everyone’s pieces at symposium was a time, especially because some were to talented and exactly as their species.  I couldn’t help but compare mine and find all of the ways I could have made mine better.

I recently decided to recreate one of my sketches on the larger paper, albeit more refined and detailed.  The Florida gallberry (Ilex glabra) shrub has small black berries and yellow-green leaves.  At the time I took my reference photo, it had none of its white flowers, though it had a good number of its berries.  

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Mar. 9th-29th

The last of the field trips were done, and it was time to start on our Symposium pieces. I had very little direction in the beginning and was a lot of the reason I didn’t start it earlier than I did. I hadn’t even known what subject I wanted to draw, having been bouncing between the birds and the Man o’ War. Even after I decided on the birds (the Ruddy Turnstone and a Sanderling), I didn’t quite know how to approach the piece. This is where art club came in.  Tracy mentioned it during class, and Emily and I decided to go together. It proved to be invaluable; I learned how to use watercolor to capture the texture of the feathers, and it was also a peaceful and productive atmosphere to work in.  I used graphite to outline the birds and add minor details; I later went in with Grumbacher watercolor as well as watercolor pencil for further detailing. The Ruddy Turnstone turned out better than the Sanderling as far as the detailing and proportions went.

Later I had problems as far as matting and framing went. Because I cut my paper down from the original size, I didn’t have a normal sized piece of paper that most mats would fit. I had also misjudged the mat sizing, and so I had to paint the previously taped spots on my piece. In my opinion, adding the background to the sides reduced the quality simply because I couldn’t get the wash right.

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Mar. 1st-8th

Dr. Moore decided to deviate from the syllabus and take us to Grassy Waters instead of spending another day at the Greenway.  Grassy Waters is part of the original Everglades and is one of the last original preserves.  At the entrance of the park, Dr. Moore gave his usual background speech, though this trip we were not required to create sketches.  The preserve was beautiful and had a number of species that many of us did not recognize a first. Emily spotted Golden Apple Snail eggs in a number of places, and we saw ibises and hawks and lizards throughout the trails and listened to the barking of certain toads. Grassy Waters is a beautiful park. Though not a place I would have visited otherwise, I’m glad it was included in the class trips.

 After the trip, I did a rough sketch of an Ibis that I saw at the end of class.  I used normal graphite pencil for the most part, though I used watercolor pencil for the vibrant red/orange of the bill and legs.

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Feb.22nd-28th

The Abacoa Greenway.  A surprisingly large stretch of nature within residential Jupiter. This part of the development was left alone to create an area that mimics Florida’s natural flatwood habitat; it serves as a recreational area for people to run or bike, or in our case draw any of the numerous different species found within the scrub or ponds. Dr. Moore, as always, discussed a few of the different species of the habitat and the way the mini eco-system was created. After his brief informative gathering we were free to wander the area.

 The sun shone brightly, and I sought many of the shadier paths, as did many of my classmates.  As I wandered, I witnessed a few of the burnt trees, the result of the wildfires that become necessary for the habitat to thrive.  They were interesting to look at, but I found I was not as compelled to draw them as some other subjects I would see later in the day. Much of the scenery was the same, no surprise there, but I kept searching for a brightly colored something to draw.  I had seen some plants with bright pinky-purple berries, one of which had several spider webs enveloping it.  

 I ended up taking pictures of an iridescent beetle, a few lizards, as well as a myriad of plants.  I later chose to sketch the beetle, the “Green” Blue Milkweed Beetle (Chrysochus cobaltinus), a brown anole, and a part of the Florida Gallberry shrub (Ilex glabra).  With both, I used a mix of colored pencils and watercolor. 

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Feb. 15th-21st

Coral Cove. Day 2.

Coral Cove was full of people, no surprise as it was a warm, sunny day.  Right before the stairs over the dunes, I saw a lot of partially sunbleached sea grape leaves, so I grabbed one thinking the bright colors along with the greyish white part would make an interesting subject. On the beach,  I saw many of the same critters though there were significantly less of the brightly colored man o’ wars. The few clusters we had found were almost completely translucent and dried up. Wandering along the beach, Emily and I also ended up collecting a bunch of different shells (none of which I decided to draw, but they were pretty).  After awhile, I sat close to the rocks and started to sketch the leaf which is quite honestly a task when you’re at the beach surrounded by all the other things going on. Towards the end of class, there were a bunch of birds running around, and I managed to get a picture of some of them. Later I looked up the kinds of birds I saw, and there were a couple different types of sandpipers: Ruddy Turnstones and Sanderlings. The birds were both on the smaller side as well as being wading birds.  They’re part of the Scolopacidae family.  I made rough sketches of both as well as a colored drawing of the seagrape leaf (Coccoloba uvifera).  Seagrapes are native to coastal areas in both the Americas and the Carribbean.

When I started to color the leaf, I wasn’t a fan of the way the lines of the colored pencils (Derwent) looked or the lack of saturation.  I’m still hesitant to add water to this sketchbook, but when I did, the pigment became more vibrant and looked more similar to smooth leaf.  I also added water to an earlier jellyfish, and I liked the result much better compared to plain colored pencil.

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Feb. 8th-14th

This past class we visited Coral Cove and it was a nice change of scenery.  Never having really sketched outside before, I thought it was really pretty and definitely something I’m going to try to do more often.  Though I do get distracted rather easily, especially if a bunch of school children show up for 10 minutes.  When we first got to the beach, Dr. Moore talked about the different environments around, including the mangrove forest and the Anastasia formation.

As I wandered the beach, I saw a bunch of man o’ wars, a lot looked relatively fresh too.  I ended up drawing one of them, though the translucent-ness was difficult to portray with the colored pencils I had.  A lot of the rocks had a variety of crevices with little creatures, chitin, a lot of algae, a lot of barnacles as well.  As I was drawing some of the man o’ wars and barnacles, I kept seeing birds (sandpipers and ruddy turnstones mostly) hopping around.  I definitely want to try to draw one of them next week; particularly the little sandpipers.  It’ll be a challenge to even get a photo of one that’s not blurry but I think seeing enough of them will give me a good idea. I also sketched a different jellyfish with more vibrant colors; I liked the idea of it, but I would still like to attempt to find a bird to render.

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Feb. 1st-7th

This week’s drawings were a lot easier than the pine cones. Dr. Moore brought in a couple different types of microscopes for us to try and learn about.  Some of the class went to use those, and in the meantime the rest, including myself, discussed our pine cone study.  A few were complete, though many, including mine, were not.  The incomplete provided a view into the process in a way which was part of the discussion.   I liked seeing how everyone else was approaching their drawing because all were rather varied.

As far as the microscope portion, Emily and I found old honeycomb from the garden and put that under the AmScope.  It was interesting to see all the little nicks within the holes already; there was also a lot of water in it because of all the rain.  There was a worm in the other honeycomb part that ended up in Emily’s sketchbook.  I hadn’t had a chance to use the other microscope which let you see both the specimen and whatever you were drawing at the same time, but it looked interesting.

At some point, Professor Lemeh had the class go out and collect some sort of object/item to draw, and I found a small coconut from somewhere on campus.  With this as well as the honeycomb I wanted to try using watercolor on larger drawings.  I found that while my sketchbook can take watercolor (I used the cake Grumbacher) it doesn’t take it well.  It dries fine but is definitely made to take a lot of water; the page is now a little warped and a little folded but overall okay.

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Jan. 25th-31st

For this week’s class project, we were to pick a ball moss specimen as well as an item from Dr. Moore’s collection.  He had an assortment of bones, shells, and other small things that people could choose from.  Though we were all required to draw one of the ball moss, we were free to choose another item.  I chose to draw a brightly colored shell that I later learned was the shell of a Florida tree snail, Ligius fasciatus.  The in class assignments were not too much of a challenge; the shell had an easy shape, but the ball moss was slightly more of a challenge simply due to the small details.  I ended up finishing the coloring part later with water colour pencils.  They give nice base that you can add detail to later if water is added.

The real challenge of this week came from assignment given to us at the end of class. We were tasked with a pine cone study.  It was most definitely a challenge, even more so than I had thought when I first received the handout (I already felt the horror at first glance).  Being that the project was daunting, of course I started it later than I should have.  It definitely took a lot longer to finish than I had anticipated; it actually rolled into the next week.  I first started the outlines and basic detail with pencil, and later I went back over with a roller ball pen or a Sharpie pen. The details were tedious, and it was sometimes difficult to tell which part I was on, taking a step back helped with that.  Overall though, I’m pretty happy with the way it turned out despite it being a challenge and hard to start.

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Jan. 18th-24th

This week’s project had us venturing out to the Arboretum.  To those unfamiliar, it’s a little nature area on campus filled with different plants, bugs, and various other creature. It was originally supposed to have been separated into areas with different themes.   We were given the freedom to wander and find a specimen that caught our eye which we were to sit and sketch.  After wandering for a period and much internal debating, I found a small flowering bush which I decided to make my project.  Sitting in strong sunlight, I began my sketch, most of which I finished in the hour and a half we were given.  At some point Dr. Moore came and helped me to identify it as Plumbago auriculata var. alba.  Though the flowers looked like a very light purple to me, it is of the white variety.  Finishing the sketch later in the week, I also had to figure out how I wanted to add color.  I eventually decided to use Derwent watercolor pencils because I thought they could best match the colors I had observed.  While I colored the flowers, I found I couldn’t get the shade quite right and ended up making the flowers a tad more saturated than I had meant to.  Though given how long it’s been since I’ve used the pencils, I am not entirely unhappy with the result.  I added color only in part to preserve the other detail I had initially made in graphite, yet I had wanted the color just to give an idea of what the rest of the plant would look like.

The Plumbago auriculata is a plant native to South Africa and is commonly known as a cape leadwort or cape plumbago and is of the family Plumbaginaceae.  It prefers full sun (I could see that in its placement in the Arboretum) and can be grown as a houseplant or a larger shrub.  They have different varieties that vary in color rom a dark blue to a white.  The ones that I found were of the white variety though looked more purple than blue or white. 

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Jan. 11th-17th

During the first day of class, we immediately delved into the art and science of field sketching.  Dr. Moore first introduced us to the basics of field sketching and what it entails.  He showed the uses of being able to blend ones scientific skills and the importance of bringing art into the matter; this sort of mixing of skills can result in creating field guides.  He also demonstrated the importance of accurate note-taking and how some of the older examples have led to the identification of new species.

Basic art techniques and skills were introduced later by Dr. Lemeh.  She  demonstrated things such as cross hatching and stippling, among others, and how to create a gradient with them.  Different types of art mediums and their variations (graphite and the softness or hardness) were also briefly discussed.  I was already familiar with many of these subjects because of the classes I had taken in high school.  

Throughout  the week, I’ve worked on the skills packet as well as as the drawing of my collected specimen.    In doing this, I have started to reacquaint myself with many of the tools commonly used in art and drawing.  The assignment has shown me that there is a lot that I’ve lost but I know soon it will improve once again.

The specimen I collected was a leaf from a plant commonly known as Croton Petra (Codiaeum variegatum petra).  The leaf was collected from under one of the vibrantly colored plants on campus.  The croton petra is native to some western Pacific islands as well as southern Asia.  These plants require strong sunlight and lots of humidity.  Some of the plants can grow up to ten feet high, but many varieties used for landscaping are much shorter, being of the dwarf variety.  Different varieties show different colors; the ones on campus exhibit bright green, yellows, reds, and oranges while other varieties may have pinks or purples.