I got carried away by rediscovering my long-forgotten Lamy Safari. I ended up buying two more cheap fountain pens, a Pilot Kakuno and a Platinum Preppy. All with fine nibs. Now I don’t know what to do with all those pens. I guess I have to get back to journaling, then. 🖋️
Inked my Lamy Safari with Pelikan 4001 Blue-Black and it is so much better than the Lamy’s Amazonite I was using before. I thought I was too messy, smudging everything, fountain pens were not for me. Turns out it was the lamy ink! Now I’m finding excuses during the day to write by hand, lol. 🖋️
I’m really pleased with my book reading this past year. I had a goal of 10-12 books in 2025, no pressure… I have too many hobbies to commit deeply to anything. I managed to read 19!! 🤓📚
The more time I spend with my sketchbook, the less I want to be online. It’s all so boring, blogging, reddit, youtube, all of it. I want to be all the time in the real analog world, with paper and pen, my cameras, my piano, gardening, baking. I’m so tired of the internet, it’s not fun anymore.
And to think a week ago I could only draw stick figures! Of course, I’m using reference photos and following step by step instructions, but still! 🎨🖌️🤩
Worked on lesson 6 of SketchLoose free beginner’s course last night. And used a blow dryer for the 1st time to accelerate the process! 🎨🖌️
I am super loving this artistic side of me! 🎨🖌️ This is day five in Toby’s free beginner course, “A House in Japan”.
My Escoda Versátil watercolor brushes have arrived!! I got the round brushes in sizes 10, 6 and 2 to get started :) Looking forward to painting EVERYTHING I see!!! 🎨🖌️
Today on Draw With Me, Charles Dickens' Ghosts of Christmas! Happy Holidays! 🎄🎉🎨🖌️
🎨 My first watercolor! I love how my sketch turned out, but the paint part was hard. That sky looks terrible, LOL! I kept practicing with other reference photos and eventually figured out what I was doing wrong (a mix of bad brushes and too little water).
Today I joined a live Draw with Me with Danny Gregory on youtube, for the first time. The hour went by really fast, I had so much fun! Did my artwork with ink and crayola markers 😀🎨🖌️ #SBSDrawWithMe
TLDR; It it possible to use DxO Photolab to edit raw files produced by ANY camera that is not on their supported list, even from mobile phones such as Samsung and Xiaomi. It involves using two free tools, and the terminal/command line. Skip to the workaround for instructions. Even though I shoot raw exclusively on my Canon cameras, I’m completely fine shooting jpegs when the camera’s internal processor is good enough for that.
Moving on from this. Colored pencils are beautiful, but slow! I think my next one will be a base of water markers with the pencils on top. 🎨🖌️
First day doing the free course over at Sketch Loose and my first urban sketch ever! Learned to simplify shapes and draw from a reference image 🎨🖌️😍 Can’t wait to learn about watercolors!
I have just discovered the concept of loose lines sketch and look at this! I have filled a page with vegetables, pens, a water bottle and two plant pots! I CAN DRAW! Stick figures, no more! 🖌️
Finished reading: We by Yevgeny Zamyatin 📚
One of the first dystopias, came out in 1924 and inspired many down the line. A totalitarian regime, literal glass walls, state-assigned lovers, where mathematical logic rules over individual behaviour. If you could only choose one, Freedom or Hapiness?
Finished this page with water markers! Next up: colored pencils! 🎨
I’ve been living for the past 15 years with a massive question mark: to blog in English or Portuguese? EN is my main language for everything, web, books, movies, work and even marriage! PT-BR is the language of my IRL family and friends, probably the only folks who want to read my stuff.
🤧💉 Did a prick allergy test! Allergic to all kinds of pollen and stratospheric levels of dust mites allergy! Doctor thinks the immunization shots would be nice in my case. 🌶️ Bought a Peugeot Paris pepper mill and I’m in love! I didn’t know what I was missing. Never again will a grocery store pepper grinder enter my kitchen. 🎄 We got an Escape the Room Advent Calendar book this year again.
Did an allergy prick test yesterday. Tested positive to a ton of stuff – some known: birch pollen, dust mites; some suspected: almonds, cypress pollen; and some surprises: all other kinds of pollen, nuts, cats and DOGS!