USK SEATTLE – Ballard Locks

Look at all of us enthusiastic urban sketchers, please disregard the gray clouds.

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Finally, I was able to make it to Urban Sketchers Seattle’s monthly outing, and this time it’s held at the iconic Ballard Locks. The Hiram M. Chittenden Locks is a set of locks located at the west end of Salmon Bay (I love all these confusing sounding names). I’ve only been here once and I remember it being equally windy and gray.

Swagatika and I arrive a bit late, but we can already see the large group gathering from afar before everyone disperses. I anticipated that there won’t be many places to sit, so I opted for a more portable urban sketching setup (watch the video of my USK set up here.)

The lightweight foam board and the postcard-sized paper allows me to stand easily at any location without much stress on my arms. Continue reading

NYC Urban Sketchers Portrait Party

I’m in New York City again! A spontaneous decision brought me to this bustling city for the long weekend (and away from freezing Boston and its -16F temperature…). Since I’ll be missing my weekly meet with fellow urban sketcher (USK) friends in Boston, I immediately check to see if there are any drawing sessions with the NYC group.

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Boy, am I in luck! This weekend the USK meet up in New York City is holding a portrait party. To sum it up, everyone take turns being the live model for 10 minutes, and at the end of the session, we will each have created tons of portrait drawings of all the participants.

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I’ve always been daunted by drawing portraits and people because I’m not very skilled with proportions. My biggest problem is to even get the ‘creatures’ to look ‘human-like’ LOL. However, this portrait party is just too big of an opportunity to miss, so I signed up for it anyway. Continue reading