Geo Exposure 2: Macro Micro

A little more than a month ago, I finished the second piece entitled Macro Micro for the Geo Exposure series. I took a different approach to overcome the challenge that this work posed to me. 

First time to use an artist grade set of colored pencils.

It was my first time to use Derwent Coloursoft pencils and also my foray to using artist grade colored pencils. With their softness and vibrance, I really had a fun time blending the colors.

For the reference, I used a few photos that I took from my travels to the city of Puerto Princesa, the capital of the province of Palawan which is found on the western part of the Philippines, and the town of Daet in Camarines Norte that is located on the eastern side. They are flowers floating on water in a stone basin and surfers looking out to the Pacific Ocean, respectively.

Traced out the lines that would divide the composition. This hibiscus was such a pain as it took me three hours to render.

I merged the photos using GIMP and then I saw a problem. The resulting photo was too big for the size that I was going to use. It would be hard for me fit it all in and I might lose the details along the way. To resolve the problem, I picked some parts of the photo that struck me the most for the render and then divided the drawing area using lines. I also made use of hexagonal cutouts of different sizes to trace the hexagons. These contained small parts from the merged photo and another related photo.

Here's the progression of Macro Micro, beginning with the render of tree branches from the surfers' photo. Forgive me for the inconsistent lighting on the photos, some days had gloomy weather.

I had to turn the paper upside down to do the wooden bridge which gave me a difficult time in layering the dark colors.

What a huge relief and great joy I felt when I got through the flowers!

I thought the ultramarine shocked me the most with its richness. Oddly, my favorite part of the painting is the stones.

As for the title, Macro describes the closer look on the flowers, stones, and the wooden posts. After finishing this, I stared on the flowers and imagined living like Thumbelina, jumping and dancing blissfully around those petals. The Micro depicts the small size of the surfers as compared to the vast ocean. It was marvelous to see the Pacific Ocean when I was there that time and the surfers were greatly enjoying the waves.

Macro Micro, colored and watercolor pencils, 8.5 x 11 Bristol board.