Nature Journaling + Sketching

Ideas and inspiration for nature journaling including nature sketchbooks, observing nature and creating art from those observations, sketching while in nature, and field sketching. Find prompts, tips and techniques for documenting your time spent in nature through drawing, writing, and mixed media art. Get outside and use your nature journal to record the plants, animals, weather and landscapes you encounter through sketches, watercolors, collages or written observations.
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Sketchbook Tour in spring: March – May 2021
It’s time for another sketchbook tour. This one spans from March to late May 2021, and it’s all about spring. While I’m often focused on sketching birds during the winter months, I enjoyed sketching the first soft green and the different spring flowers this year.
How I use colored pencils for sketching
I like to have a few colored pencils around for sketching, but I don’t usually use them alone. Rather, I combine them with watercolor to add texture and detail. I find colored pencils can often bring out certain fine details better and in a more controlled way than fiddling with fine brushes, and sometimes I use them instead of pencils for sketching.
My Sketchbook in February 2019 | Julia Bausenhardt
My Sketchbook in February 2019 – Julia Bausenhardt
Sketchbook Tour Winter 2021/22: More local flora studies + landscapes
Welcome to 2022 on my blog! I still have a few sketchbook outtakes to share from the end of last year, and a few from January, so I might as well start with a sketchbook tour. Most of these still are studies of local orchids and other plants. In 2022 I started things very slowly with landscape and tree studies – I’ve really come to like drawing trees without leaves.
What studying nature and sketching do for my mental health
Every time I put pencil to paper, or hold up my pair of binoculars and take notice of the birds outside, or raise my camera, my worries seem a bit farther away and I’m just focused on the weird and wonderful life out there. In short, I feel much less stressed, my motivation to make art comes back, and I just feel more positive all around when I investigate one of nature’s small or big mysteries.
How to get started with birding
Birding is a wonderful pastime that I somehow never get tired of, and I see something new each day. In short: birding can be an excellent first connection to nature because birds are accessible, fun and interesting and you can observe them everywhere.
Sketchbook Tour Fall ’21: Detailed nature studies (plants, birds, bats)
Starting with common flax (Linum usitatissimum) I explored a number of meadow and field flowers. Flax is an incredibly beautiful and delicate flower, and I found it hard to get right on this structured paper. If you grow it yourself you can harvest a small amount of your own linseeds from each plant.
Sketchbook composition and arranging elements on the page
It can make a huge difference if you place an element on the right or the left, if you draw it big or small, so it’s worth thinking about how you arrange elements on your page before you start. Combining both large and small elements on a page will make it visually interesting, as will elements with and without color, or with different levels of detail. Variation and rhythm are important for an interesting composition.
keep it simple | tips for a stress free sketchbook practice
keep it simple | tips for a stress free sketchbook practice - YouTube
Sketchbook Tour Spring 2023 – flowers, travel sketching, landscapes
Here’s another sketchbook tour for the first quarter of 2023. Lots and lots of flowers, some travel sketching and a few larger landscapes.
4 easy tips for your sketchbook practice | how to keep sketching
Keeping a regular sketchbook practice can be hard, and I’d like to take a quick look at the aspects that were most helpful for me – things that made returning to my sketchbook easier.
Learn everything I know about drawing
This course is basically all I know about drawing, and how you can fundamentally build your drawing skills through learning the right techniques and regular practice.
Sketchbook Tour Spring 2022 – spring green, orchids, missing insects
It’s time for another sketchbook tour, this one will cover the sketches I completed in the spring of 2022. One thing I’m noticing about my sketchbook work recently is that I’m drawing slowly and with more intent, and that I’m focusing more on each subject. From a naturalist standpoint, I welcome this, it means I learn more about what I draw and I’m more likely to identify a species when I see it again.