More sketches in the new Canson Sketchbook

I’ve been doing a little more work in my new Carson mixed media sketching journal today. I mentioned that I like the way that it takes fineliner when I tested it and made my first sketch in it on Monday. After making two ink sketches in it today I stand by that. It’s quite similar to sketching in the Seawhite Travel Journal, I find, even though the paper in the Seawhite is much lighter at only 130 gsm.

So this first sketch is a copy of one of the Harry Rountree (1928) illustrations of the Pig and Pepper chapter in Wonderland. Now, I’ve made most of my other Harry Rountree copies in the Royal Talens book. What I find with that is that you have to use a thinner nib whenever you’re doing something a little more detailed. I was perfectly happy with a 0.1mm nib to make this sketch. I found it gave me a lot of control and meant I could sketch pretty accurately. In fact I’m sure I could have used a nib that was a least twice as thick and achieved just as good results.

So this encouraged me to try it out with a copy of an Edgar Thurstan illustration. This is my copy of Edgar Thurstan’s illustration of Alice entering the Looking Glass. I think it has come off a wee bit better than the copies I made in the Royal Talens book using the same nib. Here it is:-

I think I should also point out that this was made on the other side of the page on which I made the watercolour and ink sketch of Disneyland Paris. The paper is so robust that you can do this without ay issues at all.

Here's the same sketch alongside my copy of the Tenniel illustration. Tenniel’s illustration is accompanied with a Mirror image illustration of Alice emerging on the other side on the reverse of the page. Edgar had to do it all in just the one illustration.

I think Edgar gets maybe just a little further away from Tenniel in this one than he does in quite a few of his other illustrations. Alice has a glass dome clock to her right in both illustrations. The interior of the fireplaces are similar. To her left Tenniel’s Alice has a vase under a dome. There’s a similar vase on Thurstan’s Alice’s left, but this doesn’t have a dome. There’s also a more prominent vase on the right too. Tenniel’s mirror is square, while Thurstan’s is a more ornate, bowed shape. I some was I’m put in the mind of the way that Edgar worked on Tenniel’s original with the train carriage illustration. In both, if I can use a photographic analogy, he's not only positioned the ‘camera’ to look down on he scene from a bit of an angle, he has also zoomed out a little which means he gets to show more of the scene than Tenniel does.

I have to say, this was another of Edgar’s illustrations that I have thoroughly enjoyed copying. I don’t think I can put poor old Edgar up on a pedestal with Tenniel, because a lot of his illustrations to seem so derivative. But then, if you’re going to be derivative, the do it well and do it interestingly and I think that Edgar certainly manages to do this.