As much as I wanted myself to do lots of drawing while in Sri Lanka I somewhat fell below my own expectation. I managed to do one on my pocket size watercolour Moleskine, nevertheless.
It was a kitchen scene at the second guesthouse I stayed in Kandy.
After rendered it with watercolour, here is the finished art piece.
Me drawing in the kitchen. Behind me is the household helper grating a mature coconut using the old fashioned way.
One piece of drawing is better than none at all. 
Found this outdated post saved as an unpublished draft in my blog so I decided to now publish it.
It was at a park called Taman Jaya near Amcorp Mall in P.J., Selangor where I stopped by the morning to sketch this tree. Did the colouring when I got home.
Pen : Lamy Safari Charcoal Fountain Pen Extra Fine Nib
Ink : Noodler’s Ink Polar Black
Medium : Daler-Rowney Aquafine Watercolour & Staedtler Karat Aquarell Watercolour Pencils
Brush : Rarhael Martre No. 6
Material : Moleskine Pocket Size Daily Planner 2009 (Soft Cover)
Read Deuteronomy 30:19
Pen : Lamy Safari Charcoal Fountain Pen Extra Fine Nib
Ink : Noodler’s Ink Polar Black
Medium : Daler-Rowney Aquafine Watercolour
Brush : Rarhael Martre No. 6
Material : Moleskine Pocket Size Daily Planner 2009 (Soft Cover)
How many times when you’re in a situation you tend to talk about your problem and complain about it? We will find that most of the time by doing that you won’t solve the problem but it gets worse as you talk more about it.
The revelation to you today is that do not talk about your problem but talk to your problem instead! Do not speak about how big your problem is but speak to that problem how big God it!
“… if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.” – Matthew 17:20
Pen : Lamy Safari Charcoal Fountain Pen Extra Fine Nib
Ink : Noodler’s Ink Polar Black
Medium : Daler-Rowney Aquafine Watercolour
Brush : Ashley Dagger No. 3/8
Material : Moleskine Pocket Size Daily Planner 2009 (Soft Cover)
Wouldn’t you agree more?
Good thinkser are always in demand.
Choose which one who want to be – one who has the job or the one who is the boss.
I choose to be the latter.
Make a change! Be bold and courageous to step out of the boat! Have faith!
In our life mission there may be many mountains we want to conquer but God will always let us start from the smallest one first.
Taking sometime off in the morning to draw a tree at the park. Life’s great!
Something to ponder upon.
Someday when we are on our death bed who (or what) going to call upon? Our bank account? Our possessions? Or the people we love? Make a right choice today on the time we will be spending most on doing (or relationship building) that will someday be the things (or people) that stand by our side when we call upon when we are on our death bed.
Are we just too busy with our work and earning money storing up material wealth that we have no time for the people we love and building relationship with people?
I can’t remember how long since I last went for an outing with friends for a photowalk until last weekend a photography friend from Seremban suggested we have one on last Sunday in KL so we went to Pudu with another friend. Me, Ong and Kian Kheong, armed ourselves with only film cameras we roamed around the busy old Pudu market. I have been to this beautiful market a few times and it was the first time for the two guys. They could agree with me that this is a place they would like to come back again the next time. There seems to be so much to see – the charm and beauty of this old part of the Kuala Lumpur city.
As for myself, I got a little bit lazy to lug my SLR around, a little bit lazy to point at strangers and take their pictures like I usually do. I did some random shots for a bit with my little Olympus XA and got kind of bored after walking a few rounds. I wanted to do something I have not done before in this place and so I had got myself two of my Moleskine watercolour notebooks and two Lamy fountain pens ready before leaving my house on that day just in case I saw something inspiring that was worth penned down on the paper and I did. I only managed to make use of the pocket size notebook and left the other big one untouched.
Here you go – two scenes I managed to sketch out live on the spot.
First one : Chinese grocery store
This is a 50 year-old grocery store run by two Chinese men who claimed that the business was passed down to them by their former employer. Located at a corner lot of a row of shophouses in this old market. The interior space is small and congested but I find it rather interesting. Limited by time and space on my small watercolour notebook I decided to focus and pen down just a small corner of the store – where goods are hung up on the shutter doors. The owners were extremely friendly, supportive and happy to have my presence around drawing their store.
Have a closer look at the live sketch I did on site.
And rendered with watercolour when I got home.
Second one : Knife sharpening service man
It was a quick and rough sketch done as my friends and I were almost leaving this rustic yet charming place of the city when we decided to hang around this man’s humble street stall for a little while. His kind of service is one of those that have been continued down from the olden days. As of today only a few old folks who are still doing such business as of this kind. Generation comes generation goes. I doubt any of the younger ones would do this as a career anymore. It is just a matter of time this trade will be gone, forever…
Have I got enough of Pudu market yet? No. I will certainly be back for more sketches. 
By the way, stay tuned for my Pudu photos when the negatives are done.
I realised that this year my main focus and priority is more on my design business and spend more time polishing up my drawing skills, thus this decision of mine of letting go some of the cameras from my collection rather than letting them lie around collecting dust. These are the few cameras I have let go recently. I do not miss them neither do I feel sayang to have lost them in my life. I do not love things. But I am glad I have found them new owners who can take care of them now.
Canon A35 Datelux
Yashica Auto Focus
Cosina CT1 Super + Auto Sears 50mm f/2.0
More cameras to let go soon…
Been really busy at work lately. Enjoying my work to the max, though!
Here’s a very quick update on last month’s journal pages.
Japanese dinner with Mandy aka the Boss at Yuzu at The Gardens, Mid Valley City, Kuala Lumpur.
The taste of the wagyu beef on the stonegrill was most memorable of the whole meal. Juicy and tender!
Sorry, Boss, could not fit your pretty face in there as you can see the food we ordered took up the whole space already!
Tools and media :
Lamy Safari Charcoal fountain pen with Noodler’s Ink – Polar Black, Daler-Rowney Aquafine watercolour pocket set + Daler Rowney White Acrylic, Moleskine pocket diary.
Discover a great degree at landscape design training.
It was an art material and book shopping day. Got myself two books on drawing and watercolour. And found myself an A3 sized portfolio bag I was looking for for quite sometime, by chance, in an art shop in KL!
On this page I decided not to redraw with black ink like I usually do but I went on to render it with watercolours over the pencil outlines.
I quite like the result of the watercolour effect without black outline.
Tools and media :
Lamy Safari Charcoal fountain pen with Noodler’s Ink – Polar Black, Daler-Rowney Aquafine watercolour pocket set + Daler Rowney White Acrylic, Moleskine pocket diary.
I did some shopping on art materials recently and I got myself some books on drawing and watercolour painting, a watercolour pocket set, a water mixable oil colours set and a Moleskine pocket watercolour notebook. The desire within me has clearly told myself to pick up watercolour painting again after abandoning the skill for more than 15 to 20 over years. The only vivid memory I could recall myself painting with watercolour is when I was a primary school student. I cannot remember if I even did watercolour in college. But here I am giving a good start again. I find it very inspirational indeed to look at some of the watercolour artworks posted on ’skine.art website. It is totally motivational to me to once again rekindle the passion for painting with this medium!
Here I have done the first attempt of a watercolor painting after so many years. This piece was painted with a reference from an old building photo I took in Georgetown, Penang during my trip there recently.
Watercolour painting vs photograph.
Although what I painted may differ from the original picture from the photograph in terms of the proportion and scale I am quite happy with my attempt. Is not it a wonderful thing that with painting we are able to alter a picture by our own hand and make it unique according to our own style?
Passion for painting needs a lot of patience, I think.
Tools / materials :
TomBow 2B recycled pencil
Daler-Rowney Aquafine watercolour pocket set
Moleskine pocket watercolour notebook
