Winter
has arrived in Copenhagen. Over the weekend we received quite a bit
of snow and on my last sketching trip it was so cold everything in my
sketch kit acted strange, and on top of that, the hairs on my
watercolour brush were bent – what a misery. So I guess it is about
time I do an inventory.
This
is what I have
in my sketch kit
Pens
I
never, or very rarely, use pencils when I sketch. I like the
directness and honesty I get from a line I can’t erase – and I’m
too lazy to use a pencil, I just go straight in with my pens. I use
two different pens; a Copic Multiliner SP size 0.2 and a Pigma Micron
Size 0.1.
I
love the feel the Copic pen has, it fits my hand perfect. The tip is
really sharp and durable and the ink is crisp and totally black. I
love these pens and have bought more of them than I really need.
The
Pigma pen has a really nice and soft feel. The only problem I have
with these pens is that they’re a bit too small for my hand and it
seems like the tip wears down faster than it runs out of ink. But the
ink is perfect, in fact I don’t think you’ll find a pen with
better ink. It’s absolutely black, clean and crisp and never ever
bleeds. I have tested it on coffee filters and it didn’t bleed –
I’m impressed.
Brush
I
use a Kolinsky sable brush from Escoda. It’s
not as good as my other watercolour brushes (Isabey's Pure Kolinsky and W&N Series 7), but it’s really durable and works perfectly
even after spending a rough time at the bottom of my bag.
Colours
The
watercolour box I
use is an old plastic box from Winsor and Newton. It’s not very
big, only holds 12 colours, but it has a nice big mixing tray divided
into three sections with tall edges, so I can use a lot of water when
I mix my colours. I really don’t like watercolours from W&N so
I have replaced them with a mix of other brands: Sennelier, Schmincke
and Daler Rowney, all artists quality.
The
colours go
from: deep cadmium yellow, yellow ochre, three browns; raw unmber,
burnt umber and brown ochre. There’s a deep quinacridone violet
from Sennelier (they make the best purples and violets). A carmine
red, Payne’s Grey, an olive green and an
emerald
green. Two blues, an
ultra marine, and some lighter one which I’m not quite sure of -
probably a cobalt blue.
With
these colours I can go everywhere. I can mix any hue I wish and go
from sweating warm to freezing cold. I’m not a big fan of using
black, for really dark
areas I will mix blue, brown or brown and violet depending on the
tone of the area.
Sketchbooks
I
have
a sketchbook fetish, I love good sketchbooks. Ideally I really only
need one, but I always carry at least two around with me. One for
colour sketches, and one for black and white sketches.
Lately
I have started using sketchbooks from Stillman & Birn. The
quality of these books is impressively high. For colours I use the
Alpha Series, which is almost like hot pressed watercolour paper.
Smooth enough for line drawings and enough texture and depth for
watercolours. And for black and white ink sketches I use the Epsilon
Series, plate finish. I used to use a Moleskine for black and white
sketches, but the paper is terrible, it really makes me wonder why I
have gone through so many of their sketchbooks.
For
a while I used Holbein
Multimedia sketchbooks for watercolour sketches. The paper in these
sketchbooks is good fine grain watercolour paper, but a bit too thin.
And I prefer sketchbooks with a hard back not Spiral back like the
one in the Holbein Multimedia sketchbooks.
Stillman & Birn, Alpha Series Sketchbook
Miscellaneous
I
found
my stool in New York on our honeymoon. I think
I
paid around $5-6 for it, I’ll never find anything that cheap in
Denmark. I store the water in a glass jar that used to contain baby
food. It has got the perfect size, but most importantly, the lid
keeps tight. I always got some tissue paper in my bag, which I use
for cleaning and drying my brush in.
That
is what I have in my bag.
