This month I’ve been working in a Moleskine A5. This format used to be my favourite, but I am now feeling hemmed in by it. My towers barely fit on the page. These are two street scenes, the first from my car, the second done as I was perched on my stool on the sidewalk. For the Belleville sketch I wanted to be able to see right down the street and my car was a good spot for that. It is relatively private and luckily the view was unobstructed. In Kingston, a busy tourist spot even in September, I thought my spot on the sidewalk next to a bench where I could set my paints and water was good, but I realized too late that I couldn’t see the bottom of the buildings. I did the sketch anyway as well as most of the paint as I sat there, many people stopping to look and comment. I’m getting used to that–and people are invariably encouraging.
It is perspective that I am concentrating on–translating what is in front of me to the page. Shari Blaukopf made this look so easy in her class demo in Montebello last June and I am inspired by her street scenes. We are going on a trip to Ireland soon and I plan to sketch as many buildings and street scenes as I can. And I have a new coil sketchbook, 7″ x 10″ ready to go. This size is compact enough to carry easily, but big enough that I should be able to keep the scene from running off the bottom. Fingers crossed. 
Lovely!