Drawing and Painting Flowers with Coloured Pencils by Trudy Friend is a textbook teaching you techniques with coloured pencils. After and Introduction it starts with the materials. Focusing on the Derwent range of pencils it tells you all the differences between them and the effects that you can achieve with each.It also cover papers, paint-sticks and water-brushes.
The Second chapter focuses on Techniques and covers basic strokes, brush techniques, pen and ink, using masking fluid, blending, glazing, creating texture and mixing the media. It then goes on to Where to Start which covers making an initial sketch, drawing and painting and choosing a format.
Then come the exercises and demonstrations starting with Flowers in containers and each part of the process is broken down into steps taking you from the initial sketch through the stages to the completed works. Each demonstration is illustrated with beautiful drawings and diagrams showing you what technique to use where and tips and tricks to use.
From Flowers in Containers we move on to Flowers in the Garden where you are taught how to add impact to your drawing and how to do close ups of petals , leaves,bulbs and how to do trees. It then goes on to Flowers in the Countryside where you learn how to draw a field of sunflowers and wild flowers finishing with a beautiful field of buttercups.
The book mostly focuses on the use of watercolour pencils and is perfect for those of you who want to expand your skills and create your own pictures from scratch. If you wish to create original works of art I'm sure you will not be disappointed.
Full review, with images and video flip-through: https://creativecolouringwithhazel.wordpress.com/2016/08/21/drawing-and-painting-flowers-with-coloured-pencil-by-trudy-friend/
* Creative Colouring With Hazel *
Feb 14
Trudy Friend's latest book explores the joyful world of flowers - not in isolation as is so often the case - but in their settings, whether that is an overflowing window box or a herbaceous borders, flowers in a cornfield or blossom-laden trees. Using coloured pencils, both hard and water-soluble varieties, Trudy shows you how to use them to best effect, with clear examples of techniques, step-by-step stages to follow and plenty of Trudy's annotated drawings. There's useful information on creating textures, using masking fluid, and working from photographs. Readers of Leisure Painter will be familiar with Trudy's teaching style and her beautiful drawings will win over those yet to be introduced to her work.
* Leisure Painter, The *
Apr 14
Search Press have been packing a lot into their art instruction books lately, and this is no exception. It follows the pattern of Trudy's previous books in having break-out details of completed paintings, but there are also some longer demonstrations as well as hints and tips. The overall impression is of a busy and fact-packed book, and this is borne out in practice. Trudy begins with a useful survey of the various materials available today (and it's become so diverse that this is rather more than the basic overview), from simple coloured pencils to those from Coloursoft and Academy and on to Iktense and Aquatone, before looking at pastels, papers and the various watercolour options. The quite detailed illustrations in this section drive out any dryness and you can easily see how the different types produce individual results. The same thing applies to the Techniques chapter, where basic marks are quickly worked up into an example - perhaps a leaf or a petal. The detailed sections are divided into Flowers in Containers, Flowers in the Garden and Flowers in the Countryside. The categories are relatively arbitrary, but serve to avoid what could otherwise become a lengthy and perhaps even indigestible final chapter. It really doesn't matter, because this is a section you're going to want to dip into, pick and choose and just have a go. It's that sort of book: do you keep reading or put it down and get drawing?
* Artbookreview.net *
July 14
The potential of flowers for creating arresting, beautiful pictures is near endless and this book offers advice on drawing and painting flowers of all kinds in appealing and beautiful settings using coloured pencils. Explanation of the different ranges of pencils and techniques used is clearly given.
* Cake Craft & Decoration *
