Miami Beach Sketching
Miami Beach
We usually travel to Florida to escape the dreariest part of the Northeast winter in late February/early March. The excitement of the weather changing and holidays has worn off and I’m usually craving some warmth and sunshine as I await Spring’s arrival. This year we went to mid-beach Miami. The goal was to get some sunshine on the beach while avoiding party crowds & to spend time with my brother and his wife. Overall it was a delight to feel the sunshine thaw my bones and listen to the sounds of the waves while I sketched. The beach had beautiful white sand and sparkling clear blue water.
Art Supplies
For this trip, I only brought charcoal sketching supplies with me. This is the first time I haven’t taken a color medium while traveling. It felt liberating to keep things super simple and not deal with any wet mediums.
Here is what my entire kit looked like. It was very lightweight and easy to throw in a beach bag.
Inside the floral pouch, I had my main tin pencil case, a smaller tin case holding my pencil sandpaper, and a little bottle of hairspray to use as a fixative for my sketches while traveling.
The black pouch contained my drawing board and sketchbook. My preferred sketchbooks are Stillman & Birn soft covers. With charcoal, I use the Epsilon version.
So what’s in my pencil case?
A lot. Three different erasers and a nail clipper that I use to clip my mono-zero eraser into a sharp point. Various types of charcoal – white, soft, medium, hard, willow, and black chalk. An HB and 2B pencil. Several blending brushes and tortillons plus a small ruler. You will also notice that I put caps on all of my pencils. If you haven’t tried this yet it’s life-changing!
Drawing Board
Overall I loved this kit and setup. It was simple, lightweight, and casual. I didn’t need to think about what to pack because my pencils are always kept in this tin case.
Completed Sketches
My husband started a little sketch of a tarantula while on the beach. He established a pretty good outline but decided he didn’t want to go any further. While waiting at the airport I went ahead and filled it out so this one was a team effort!
I also completed two more sketches when I arrived home based on Miami’s inspiration.
There isn’t always time to finish everything on site. Allow yourself the grace to finish up when you get home if needed. That’s what reference photos are for!
