Thumbnail Sketch

Victoria – Point Hope Shipyard, thumbnail sketch, a photo by Matthew-1 on Flickr.

I don’t usually do thumbnail sketches because I rarely actually do any laborious “drawings” or large paintings.

But this is a thumbnail done for a much larger ink sketch done on a large drawing board. I wasn’t used to drawing at a large scale so I thought it might help to try and nail down the composition and perspective with a quick study.

It worked out well because the final composition was just what I wanted and as a bonus I wound up with this little vignette which turned out nicely in it’s own right. I clipped this to the fence I was looking through just beside the view I was drawing and referred to it often.

As is the nature of sketching, I recall that afternoon in vivid detail – scouting out the location, the fantastic weather that day, the conversations I had with passers-by, the way the large pen sketch used up a few markers, and the a million other tiny nuances.