Carol

I remember doing blind contour drawing in a class I took many years ago. I agree with others that it’s so challenging NOT to look! Maybe if I gave myself more space on a single page for each, these might not have been so ‘off’! Interesting and fun observation exercise.

Noticing - Form & Function.  On a recent walk at our local wildlife refuge, I noticed two large patches with multiple 1” holes in the sand, as seen in the photos above. It was startling to see all these holes along the paths, and me wonder who made them and whether both patches were made by the same creature. The refuge has lots of fire ants and also lots of Lubber grasshoppers (who hatch from the ground in early spring) at this time of year, so I guessed that these holes were homes to one of them. But when I looked up ‘ant holes’, I made a fascinating discovery - these crater-like pits appear to be the engineering feat of Antlion larvae, known to be voracious little predators.  I remembered learning years ago about how Antlion larvae hide in wait and feed on ants and other insects that fall into their traps. What an ingenious design! I also discovered that these insects are sometimes called Doodlebugs, because of the winding, spiraling trails they make in the sand when they emerge from their pits!

I agree with Andrew - I like the way you wove the text into the drawing and your sketches make me think of all the same birds we see in our nearby marshes.

I I really enjoy watching the instructional videos - thank you, Liz! And the exercises are great, so helpful.  Getting the texture and the lighting and shadow are ALL so challenging, but I realize it takes LOTS of practice.  Very inspiring to read and see everyone’s posts!

Same reaction! Awesome pear!

Thanks for sharing this progression, Gigi. They all look great to me, but now I can really see the difference from first to last!

I enjoyed drawing from the Warbler photo, though it was challenging. It’s so much easier to draw from a photo than drawing birds from real life, though, because the bird doesn’t move! I photograph birds all the time, but rarely keep up with my nature journaling, because it’s so much easier and quicker to use my camera. When drawing from a photo like this, I can spend a lot of time looking back and forth, checking details and proportions, erasing, and editing over and over, noticing so much more. I’d really like to become more intentional and committed to journaling in the field. I spend a lot of time outdoors in natural areas, mostly near marshes, ponds, and wetlands of all kinds, and worry that I’ll miss a good photo opportunity if I get “sidetracked” with my nature journal! But when I do take the time - and my sketchbook - I learn so much and SEE so much. I’m hoping this course will help me be more consistent about journaling.

I first saw this course last fall, and experimented for a few weeks with nature journaling on my own. But with so much free time during this strange “new reality”, I gave myself the gift of registering for the class – and am so glad that I did! What an inspiration! What a treasure you have created with this course... So much information and so many valuable ideas. Thank you for including the discussion board, and for allowing all of these resources to be available at any time.  I’ve been blogging about birds and nature for 6 years, and am hoping the structure of this course will help me transition to more journaling as well. My goal is to gain the motivation to make nature journaling a consistent habit. Tried to attach one of my early nature journal pages from last fall, but it didn’t work :)