Sketching with friends

Friday was another opportunity to go sketching with friends.  The venue this time was the Botanics in Edinburgh.  Much as I love going to the Botanics, I find it a difficult place for sketching.  Another difficulty I had was limited time - I couldn't stay as long as the others - sad to say this as it was such a beautiful day. 

I wanted to have a go at the Edinburgh skyline as viewed from Inverleith House.  So I sat in the sun and did this sketch.

Edinburgh Castle from Inverleith House

This was quite a quick pastel sketch and I've not quite captured it - it's not hazy enough.  But at least I did manage to do a sketch, and that's imortant!  I'm afraid there's a bit of distortion in the photo (the steeple on the left IS vertical!)

We were talking about the merits of sketching in black and white vs sketching in colour, and the consensus is that if you want to create pictures in colour, you should sketch in colour.  This is a conclusion I've gradually been reaching, so maybe I need to get back out there with watercolours.  Pastel is all very well, but you are limited by the colours in the box (and I find it much more difficult to mix them).


The other conclusion we reached was to try and set up a joint blog to gather our sketches together...so that's my next task.  Watch this space.