Last year I bought a mini ipad, principally because a friend taught me how to use an art app on her one. I was lured into buying one by seeing the diversity of ‘tools’ to hand, and the ease with which you can draw and paint, at any time and at any whim. So, having had Ellie’s instruction, (thank you Ellie) I embarked on a new experience. Now, I often sketch on ArtRage. I find it incredibly liberating, it’s excellent having colours to hand without having to set them up; particularly useful when, wherever you are, waiting for someone, having after-lunch tea at home or waiting in the airport lounge as I am now, as I write this, you can quickly take colour notes and/or sketch. It’s no replacement for the feel of pencil on paper, nor like painting with real paint, but it has other benefits. In addition, I love David Hockneys latest works, (although I believe he works with the Brushes app, and my humble sketches are not finished artworks like his of course.)
Here are some sketches I have done around our house and garden. They are simply executed partly because I haven’t quite mastered the more sophisticated effects of blending, partly because it’s speed I require and not a finished work:
However, having said that, since Anita’s comment with her advice, each image is subject to: © Copyright Liz King-Sangster All rights reserved !
the walnut tree ↓ : chez Wolfie, our swiss neighbour ↓:
our garden chairs ↓ : my potager, the artichokes ↓:
the sunlounger and cedar tree ↓ : the heart shaped cotoneaster ↓:
Graham’s garage at dusk ↓: the bins at midday ↓:
dawn through the cedar ↓ : my studio ↓ :
The Pyrenees, near Bayonne:
A couple of sketches I did when in Wales last year, the last 2 being what I call hurtling sketches ( in the car whizzing through the landscape):
A few interiors:
the rayburn, our kitchen: the sink, Meri Wells’ kitchen
Meri Wells’ studio end of our bed , with Teddy and Golly
the window, our kitchen :
the church in Sourzac : Jean-Claude’s ceramic pebbles ( the ceramic artist I exhibited with last year)
I use the ipad for most of my designing too; the Puppet Challenge storyboard was all conceived on it, see HERE, as were the 2 trompe l’œils I painted earlier this year HERE
At the risk of boring everyone, I am posting a few more sketches here: these I quickly sketched as we hurtled through the countryside ( naturally I am not driving….Graham is! ); it’s a bit of a race to get everything you want onto the ‘canvas’, as you whizz through the changing landscape, but it’s a good exercise in rapid sketching.
Norfolk teasels and phone lines:
These are rapid, but not hurtling sketches. The cat and a hat:
lizkingsangster 
These are wonderful. I’m gobsmacked at the artistry and the skill with which you wrangle such heartfelt delights out of an electronic device. I’m completely won over and think I’m going to have to succumb. Thank you, Liz, for being such an inspiration!
Love to you and the big Scottish bloke! (-;
xxx
Clive, you are too kind! You are right, you should succumb, you would soon be a Grand Master, just as you are in all the arts media; so far this medium has escaped you, and I am tickled pink to be an inspiration! The mini ipad is more handy that the ipad, it has less memory but that’s no problem, it is light and easy to travel with. BTW, that big Scottish bloke is happy as Larry, we have just been on a canal boat holiday, he loved driving it, under Dave’s instruction, and although I ended up operating the lock gates with friend Lorraine, just as all the wives do, we both loved it!xxL
Good God, Liz! If these are just sketches I’d like to see your full-blown paintings. These are masterful. I don’t think you should minimize these efforts just because they’ve been made on a computer. You are a contemporary artist using the technologies of your era—just as artists of the past embraced the camera obscura and the camera. Wouldn’t it have been amazing if the Impressionists had had this tool at hand? I would love to see these digitally printed on fine paper in both, small and large sizes. They’d be stunning… AND salable!! I do hope that you have posted these images here in low resolution. I would hate for anyone to come along and pinch them off the internet for whatever uncredited use. At a low resolution, they wouldn’t be able to make a decent print of them. Likewise, if they were mine, I would put a copyright notification on them with your name. We must protect our creative efforts!!! AM
You, Anita , are too kind too! You are right about artists through the ages embracing what is to hand, I have always felt that Leonardo would have quite happily used a camera. I don’t think anyone would be that interested in them enough to thieve them, would they? Now that you sent me into a spin of looking up advice on the net, I don’t like watermarks, so I need to ask your advice, the images are exported from the computer at approx 680 pixels, then they are uploaded to WordPress at 300px, should I export them from the computer at a smaller res? There is always something new to learn with these things!!
Liz, if you can reduce the resolution to no more than 100 or 150 dpi, and make them work on WordPress, then it would be hard for anyone to make a decent print from them. Perhaps there’s a way to prevent anyone from downloading them, but you’d have to ask how of someone with greater knowledge than I have.
AM
Thanks Anita, would you happen to know what 100 dpi is in pixels? The export mode on my computer deals in pixels only!! However, I have just trawled through all the ipad pics and reduced them to 320, I hope that will be low enough. Thanks once again.
This is. Wonderful. Liz ..How can you possibly. Create. Such. Paintings. And. Sketches. On an. Electronic device ??.
Bravo et felicitations. Encore une fois …
Hey, I wasn’t expecting this reaction! It’s rather nice though!!! Merci Nicole!