I think I enjoy drawing food more that eating it! Sketchbook Sunday!

Hi friends! I am so glad that drawing food isn’t fattening or I would be in trouble because I think drawing food is way more satisfying that eating it and the enjoyment lasts longer! I spent a little over an hour on this mixed media sketch of a slice of pizza.

I also re-homed my gouache paint. I had originally stored them in individual plastic boxes with lids because they cracked and fell out of a traditional palette and I didn’t want to waste them but I liked having them ready to go when I wanted to paint. I don’t want to bother with unscrewing tubes of paint, I am that lazy. You can see how I had them stored here. But as they dried out I realized that I did not need that much space to store them and I wanted to be able to access all of my colors at once and have them fit more compactly on my table so I went to Harbor Freight last night and found a little 18 compartment box for under $3 that would do the trick. I would have rather had a 24 compartment box but those were huge so I decided to combine colors that had the same pigments and left my 3 least used colors (black, grey and “flesh tone”) in their individual boxes. The only other drawback was that the compartments were removable so I had to glue in the dividers (Iused hot glue) to make a seal so the paint couldn’t run underneath it if got juicy. Make sure you do that if you decide to use this as gouache storage.  I did see this palette that looked like it would be a good option as the wells go all the way up to the lid but I didn’t want to spend the $10 LOL! I also added a few drop of glycerin in each pan to keep it from cracking in the future, I think after a few more uses they may settle into a nice solid cake so when I run out and refresh my paint with a new set I will add glycerin in from the get go. About 5 drops per tube and stir it in with a toothpick, use less if using less than a tube. You can see the new palette set up in the video as well as the painting demo.

Supplies: (affiliate links used)

• Sketchbook: Fabriano Venice book but that sketchbook has gotten really overpriced so I recommend a Stillman & Birn mixed media beta series or Canson XL mixed media sketchbook.
• Pencil #2 bic mechanical
• Arteza Brush Pens *Use coupon code PROMO10 if ordering here or try Amazon as they are sometimes cheaper.
• Arteza Gouache *Use coupon code PROMO10 if ordering here but amazon has a WAY better deal at regular price
• Colored Pencils: I used and prefer Prismacolor pencils but Arteza expert pencils are nice too. Currently the price is about the same for both and in that case I’d go with Prismacolor but if the Prismas go back up the Arteza are a decent alternative.
• White gel pen (or extra fine white paint pen)
• Reference photo

The thing I really like about using gouache and Prismacolors is that what you see is what you get when you look st the pencil lead or dry paint, there is little or no color shift so you can work quickly and with confidence. What are you working on today? Let me know in the comments below and til next time happy crafting!