Urban Sketchbooking

Class Includes Lifetime Access, Online Community, 6 Video Lessons & More!

6 Lessons – $72.00

In this class Lewis brings his easy, relaxed style to urban landscapes. Working exclusively in sketchbooks, he walks us through his basic steps from line to color and breaking all the rules…. a very enjoyable class!

Now available as a self-study class.

TEACHER: Lewis Rossignol

Class Description

Urban Sketchbooking
Teacher: Lewis Rossignol
6 Lessons

I’ve been working a lot in my sketchbooks of late. As a mixed media artists, I’m always bouncing around to different subject matter, concepts, and materials. One of my favorite things that I always seem to come back to is urban watercolor sketching. I find watercolors to be a very freeing medium. And combining them with landscapes made of loose line work gives you the opportunity to allow the watercolors to build mood, color and texture into your scene. 

In this class we will use mostly watercolors, liner pens, and pencil. However, I will encourage to use whatever other tools you have at your disposal to turn your watercolor sketches into more fun and detailed mixed media drawings. 

I will share with you different methods of laying down lines, as well as varied ways of using watercolor. We’ll learn how to take more control of the watercolor in some cases. But more importantly, we’ll learn how to let go of the need to control every mark. This is so important, as watercolor really looks best when you allow the water to take the color on a journey, rather than trying to force the colors to do exactly what you think it should do. 

We’ll also learn how to keep everything loose and confident, which will only make your finished pieces more visually appealing. Although our focus is on urban landscapes, these watercolor and line work methods will easily transition to any subject that you enjoy drawing and painting. I hope you can join me in this fun journey. 

Lewis

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Class Itinerary

Lessons are prerecorded and are instantly available upon signup.

Lesson 1: Reference Photos, Perspective, and Textures
In this first lesson we’ll go over what makes a great reference photo, and how to choose one that fits your skill level. We’ll also briefly touch on perspective so you have a frame of reference. Finally, we’ll work on creating textures with our pens and watercolors.

Lesson 2: Lines
Lines are the bones of urban sketching. In this lesson we’ll be creating the bones, through line work, for two different drawings, which we will work more on in Lesson 3. 

Lesson 3: Value and Texture
In this first lesson we are going to add focus, shading, texture and value to our two line drawings. We’ll do one mainly dry, with more pen and pencil marks. The other will be done with mostly brush, water and watercolor. 

Lesson 4: Timed Lines, and expressive watercolor
Possibly the most challenging, and fun lesson, we will be working on some timed line work to set up the drawings for the last three lessons. We will use a continuous line technique some of the time. We will also add some expressive watercolor to one of the drawings.

Lesson 5: Full On Watercolor
Here we are going to try some different watercolor techniques on the two unfinished drawings from lesson 4, adding a lot of texture and color to our pieces. 

Lesson 6: Finishing Touches through Mixed Media
To finish our course we will be bringing our sketches to a finished place by adding mixed media. The focus will be on using the tools that you already have at your disposal in your studio or house. Some possibilities are water soluble crayons, colored pencils, watercolor pencils, markers, poscas, colored pens, oil pastels, and the list goes on. 

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For a full list of the supplies you will need, see the tab titled “Supplies” located just under the video screen above.

Supply List

Essentials:

– Watercolor Sketchbook (5.5″ x 8.5″) I prefer to use the Stillman and Bird Delta Extra Heavyweight

– Rollerball Pens. I prefer the rollerball set with 2 black pens, 1 red, and 1 blue:

– Black and white Posca pens.

– Paint Brush. I recommend using whatever brush or brushes you already have. However you can get a set of cheap brushes at different sizes HERE, or you can go to the art shop and just pick out one medium sized brush and just use that. My favorite brushes for watercolors are round pointed tip brushes and filbert brushes.

Watercolor Set. If you already have pan watercolors, just use those. If not, Koi makes nice quality watercolors and a reasonable price: Set of 12

Set of 24:
(Bigger size isn’t necessary as you can mix your own colors using a small set)

Graphite Pencil and any eraser and smudging tool. I’m sure most of you already have this. If not, here’s a small set

Non-Essentials:

For this class we’ll mostly be working with the tools above. However during the last lesson we will be using some mixed medias. I recommend just using what you have around the house or studio. But some of my favorites, and ones I use in my demo are:

Water soluble crayons,
Vine charcoal
Posca liners
Colored pencils
Pastels
Collage

About the Teacher

Lewis Rossignol

Lewis Rossignol is a visual artist and adjunct illustration professor at the Maine College of Art and Design. He works in all kinds of mediums for clients including Tyler the Creator, Drew Taggert, HBO, Frankie Muniz, and Johnny Colt of the Black Crowes and Lynyrd Skynyrd.

Website: www.lewisrossignolart.com
Instagram: @lewisrossignol

Nuts & Bolts

– This class is now a self study and you can work the lessons on your own time schedule.

– A private Facebook group and a Padlet group (for those not on FB) will be available for you to (optionally) share your artwork and enjoy and learn from the artwork of others. You may also email your teacher directly with questions or feedback.

– You will have indefinite access to the class videos and materials.