Death Valley Sketchbook, Nov. '17

I took a sketch trip to Death Valley late last year. It was beautiful and the perfect time of year for exploring. I used a sketchbook that I made by taking a stack of 8” x 10” Fluid watercolor sheets and wire binding them between two sheets of cardboard. I did all of the sketches on location with a Sanford Uniball Micro pen and painted them later in my studio using Holbein artist watercolor. In addition to the Uniball pen, I used a Pentel Sign Pen to accentuate some of the more dominant lines. The latter is water soluble so it bleeds when painted over with water, creating some interesting effects. As always, I finished each sketch with a few touches of titanium white applied with a rigger brush.