These sketches were draw with a black Pentel Color Brush. 
I took it with me the other day to use for my "warm up drawings". It was so much fun I drew pages of horses with it.
On some of the sketches I smeared the ink a bit with water and a regular brush.
It is often several days, maybe weeks, before I finish sketches from a trip or drawing day. I don't want to start by placing water color washes over every line. Sometimes the line is the best part.
What is often missing in a sketch is the background. By background I mean everything that is not the main subject. With line work is can be difficult to not make the background too busy. My object is to insist the background play a supporting role and not take over the sketch.
The landscape changes quickly when you are riding in a car, riding a ferry or taking a train. But just like drawing a moving animal, trying to capture the movement of the changing scenery helps me quit worrying about getting it “right”.
I make quick sketches before the things changes entirely. I look for color and shapes like swirls of water or the triangles of mountains. Evidence of human occupation or a few animals help show the size of the fields or mountains.
Clouds in the sky can give the landscape painting movement. As they move across the sky the light changes and as the move away into the distance the get smaller and they get flatter on the bottom. On “cloud” days I like to sketch pages in pencil with no final drawing in mind, just cloud watching.
In the winter trees and mountains lose their detail as they move away and get lost in the mist. Colors change from clear and vibrant to soft and muted. I use opaque gouache for distant mountains and transparent watercolors for the trees, grasses and details that are close.
I look forward to the warmth of spring but I like to linger awhile in winter to paint a few more rice fields, dry grasses and barren trees.
For a list of the paints I'm currently using see the "Watercolors and Gouache" page.
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