Halloween Parade

The NYC Urban Sketchers headed to the Tomkins Square Halloween Dog Parade last weekend. My friend, Susan was hosting and we started out at the location where the marchers were lining up. We had about an hour before the parade was actually starting so we hoped we would be able to sketch a bit before it got too crowded. Catwoman and her cat dog were the first ones there so I was able to sketch them and the vehicle. I was sitting on my stool so I was looking through the bars of the barricade. The doggie wearing the tutu was there early, but she didn't like staying in one spot and her owner moved around a lot too. 

The crowd behind us got bigger as the morning went on and at one point Susan couldn't see anything from her chair so she said she was going to try moving to another spot. That didn't work well for her at all and I think she ended up being frustrated because she didn't get to sketch much of anything. After several phone calls the two of us met up and planned to go into Tompkins Square Park and meet up with any other sketchers who showed up. That was where our show-and-tell was supposed to take place. But when we walked over to the park security told us that nobody was allowed to come into the park because that's here all the marchers were ending up. Security was trying to get everyone out of the park. We didn't have a way to contact anyone else so Susan posted on FB that there would be no show-and-tell because the park was closed. It turned out there were about 8 sketchers in the park sitting near each other. They had their own show-and-tell and actually were able to sketch a few of the dogs from the parade.

Susan and I were tired and sort of lost our ambition to sketch by that point. We needed to get away from the huge crowd and we ended up walking quite a ways over to Union Square Park on 14th Street. We sat in the park for a while and then went to get some water at Whole Foods before heading home.

It was a fun experience trying to sketch that crazy crowd...but I don't think I would do it again!

Inktober Day 17

 Today's prompt was "use three values." I found a Bronco in the parking lot when I went shopping. It was perfect for a black brush pen, a gray brush pen and the white of the paper.

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Inktober Day 16

 

With a prompt of "frames" I wondered if the frames themselves would be the items being sketched or what was in them. Since I sketch mostly from life and en plein air I did a live subject. I headed over to Islip Town Beach because even though it is fall, today's temperature nearly reached 80. There was a collection of about 30 gulls on the sand near where I was parking. Before I could even think about getting out of the car raindrops started falling...slowly at first but with more intensity after a while. So I sat in my mobile studio and designed a few frames. Then I filled each with a sketches of gulls.

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Inktober Day 15

 "Snippets" was the prompt today for Inktober. I know that at this time of year Bellport has their scarecrows hanging so I headed there. These are all small...no larger than 3 x 4. Two are fun scarecrows for the contest...Red Riding Hood and Serial Server. Notice I added a bit of color to Red. Her coat definitely needed the color. The pumpkins and the corn stalk as well as the welcome anchor were on display in front of Porters on the Lane.

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Inktober Day 14

 The prompt for Inktober today was "foreground/background." This was sketched in Sayville by Green's Creek County Park. I used a brush pen for the foreground and then a Lamy Pen filled with Noodler's Gray Ink tof the back bulkhead and the water.

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Inktober Day 13

My prompt for Inktober Day 13 was "water soluble ink." I used Noodler's Brown Ink which is water soluble. I don't think it looks brown. It definitely has a brownish purple look to it. This was sketched in Patchogue by the Leeward Cove Marina. I don't know how they get the boats up top for storage, and I've seen some really large ones up there. I'm sure it would be interesting to watch.

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Inktober Day 12

 Rain was in the forecast, but the prompt was "try many textures" and it seemed that an outdoor sketch would work best. It was raining lightly but I sat near the Islip Grange in Sayville.. I used a combination of a twig, a wooden pencil, a feather (didn't work well at all), a Q-tip, a dip pen, and the edge of a credit card to get the different textures. I also had a small pine cone but I couldn't find a way to dip it into the ink. I should have brushed some ink on it by hand.