Loose Style Watercolor : Lighthouse

Hey, it is, um, Thursday, August 13th, 2026. I'm Jason with The Inkspired Life. It is so fun to be here on a Thursday night, and I hope you're having an awesome day today. Um, yeah, join me for a little bit here. Here's what I want to do. Um, You've been seeing me doing a lot of sketching, New York City architecture sketching, and I love it. That's my passion. But, uh, this week I am branching out a little bit with some encouragement from a dear awesome man and friend of mine, um, Rue, ruedoodles.com. Check them out. And, um, yeah, he's been encouraging me and teaching me and giving me some pointers on how to do Kind of landscape watercolor stuff. So join me on this journey as I'm learning the process of how to do some loose, kind of loose style landscape watercolor sketching stuff. Um, and I'm kind of focusing on Maine, Maine-inspired, um, paintings. So yeah, hope you're doing great. Feel free to say hello in the comments. I will check, and it's awesome to be here. So before we, um, do any kind of painting, I want to show you a few of the things I've been— just, this is practice, practice stuff, um, a starting point. So just kind of where the path started and where it's headed, and underneath is what we'll work on today. I want to kind of wrap this one up. I started it earlier today. So here we go. So this is a cool, um, little sketchbook here, watercolor paper. This has a light wish on it. Light wish. Um, yeah, a friend gave it to me to use, and, uh, so I've been using it. And here's, here's some of the things. By the way, here's a shout out to, um, right here, Rude Doodles. He's awesome. Please check him out. Dear, dear man, friend, uh, mentor of mine. So here's kind of like, uh, the very first kind of, uh, coastline here, coastline sketch. Let me zoom in a little bit if I can. That's okay, I could just do that. Boom. So you can see I was practicing some stone up there, some scribblys going on. And again, this is just practicing, just got to start somewhere. And this has been fun. It's a combination of Sharpie and different watercolor paints, and there's some white gel pen on here also. So that was like number one, and then we did another one. Here's another one. Pretty cool. I like this one. And right, we're not— the idea is not to create accurate photographic, um, paintings. It's just to capture the idea, the feeling, a vibe. So that's kind of going for just like a rocky shoreline, some trees in the background. And then here's, uh, here's another one. This one's pretty cool. I like the lighthouse on this one. Uh, yeah, I need some water. Actually, it's lemonade. Um, so this came out cool. Another, again, loose, quick, kind of fun, a little bit scratchy, and I really like it. And then here's, here's the one, uh, here's actually another one I forgot about. This one, here's another one inspired by, uh, one of my favorite places in Maine, Pemaquid Point. Just kind of down here looking up these amazing rock formations. Up towards this building. I'm trying to remember. I think it's like a bell tower building. It's not the lighthouse. The lighthouse is actually beyond. Can't see it in this picture. So there you go. Just another example. So tonight, I just want to finish. I want to work on this. Finish it. I started this one today. This is actually inspired by the Burnt Island Light. In Southport, Maine. So we have it, I have it pretty well blocked out. We'll add a little bit more color, we'll pull out some of the rocks more, add a little bit of detail, I think, as well. So hang with me for a few and let's kind of work on it. Yeah, let's— I'm going to zoom in on it. Hello, Sally for Art. Good to see you. Hope you're doing well. Awesome to see you on the Instagram. Hope you're doing great. Hey, I see Becky. Becky's on YouTube. Becky, how are you? Special, special shout out to you. Thank you for sending that incredible postcard. I love it. I have it hanging up over here. Thank you so much for that Statue of Liberty postcard. It meant the world to me. It was so—I just got home yesterday, and it was so awesome to get that in the mail from you. So, special shout out. It was—I love it. Thank you so much. I hope you're doing well, my friend. Long, long time. No Zoom. No see, no Zoom. We got to get together with our Inklings on Zoom. That would be so fun. Thank you again so much. Um, yeah, it's great to see you guys. Thanks for popping on and hope you can stick around for a few minutes. Feel free to ask questions. And I, um, I am working on— well, you can probably tell I'm doing some landscapes inspired by our friend Mr. Rue. Um, I had the, the blessing and privilege of, of spending a few days with him this week, and it was amazing. We did a lot of art, a lot of talking, a lot of inspiration, and he, uh, he has me down a path of doing some kind of Maine-inspired landscapes. So that's what I'm working on now. And go back to the beginning if you want to see some of the earlier sketches. I'll show you guys. Here's some of the kind of first-round attempts at working on some landscapes, you know, with some feedback from, from my friend. So here's kind of a very first kind of crack at a kind of rocky coastal Maine landscape. And then these are all practice ones, of course. This is a second one I did here. Hey, Laura's in the house. Laura, how are you? So good to see you. Hope you're doing well. Great to see you. This is fun. Sally for Art would like a Zoom. Yeah. All right, let me know in the comments, guys, who would like a Zoom. We can, um, let's do a Zoom before the summer's out and school starts. That would be fun. We can I, I think we would just do a hangout Zoom. Everybody can do their own sketching, whatever, coloring, painting on their end. I'll do what I'm doing, and we'll hang out for like an hour and in Zoom world and connect and talk and share ideas and be creative. Um, here's another one, obviously. And then this is, uh, one inspired by one of my favorite places in Maine, Pemaquid Point. I love I love this location. And here's, here's what I'm working on now, which I am actually going to be putting out for, uh, I don't know if I'm gonna do, uh, like a bid thing, auction thing, or I'm just gonna put a price on it. But yeah, I'm curious to see if I can get this out there into someone's hands. It's great seeing you guys. Hopefully you can see this. If I need to zoom in, please let me know. And then I'm going to come in here with a white gel pen in a minute or so, and we're going to pull out some shapes. I just want to pop on some of this periwinkle. Here are the colors. I don't know each one by name. I have a cheat sheet somewhere. I'd have to pull that out. I could do that at some point, um, or post something later on. So I really don't know I think this is called— I think this is periwinkle, this color, but I don't really know all the other color names without looking at them. But yeah, all right, cool. Yeah, let's throw it on. I think we're at a point where I can throw down some of that white gel pen. Oh, this is so fun. Becky says always down for a Zoom hangout. All right, Becky's in. Very cool. I could put a message out to our other Inkling friends. That would be so amazing. Before I know it, school for me starts on September first, so it's not that far away. All right, let me have some drinking some lemonade. Laura says I'm hanging in there. That's good, Laura. I always love your seismic posts. How and you? Oh, I almost I actually almost dunked it in the lemonade. I love when you post about the seismic activity and all that fun stuff. All right, I said white gel pen, didn't I? Let's do it. I'm gonna zoom in. See, click here. That's cool. I think we'll leave it there. I think Becky had a comment in there about the rocks before. Yeah, so these are, um, these have been fun to kind of sketch. They're very blocky rocks, which was interesting to me as I was talking to, uh, my friend and he was kind of showing me some pictures. So, you know, some places along Maine have these really blocky, not rounded Rocks, but really it looks like someone chiseled them out, but they're actually natural. So you see how that white gel pen just kind of pulls out that shape more? I love that look. It's so cool. I have to be careful. I think if I use it too many places, it might take away from some of that impact. We'll scratch in maybe some Tree trunks there. No one says they have to be straight, right? We can have leany, leany trees. I don't know if that's a word. Is leany a word? We have some leany trees. And pardon my face camera here, it likes to turn on and off. So if my head is kind of frozen and stuck there, it's just this camera I think has seen better days. So there we go. So yeah, this camera here gets stuck. Don't, don't mind that. It's just— It's just feeling old, I guess. It's feeling old. It's an old soul camera. Um, yeah, I'm not sure why it's freezing sometimes, but you know what? The show must go on, right? And I'm gonna just put some black ink between some of these rocks here. It's looking pretty cool. I'm liking it, liking it. So this is burnt— burnt— this is based on Burnt Island Light in Southport, Maine. So it's based on a real location. Does it look exactly like this? No. Do I want my sketch painting to look exactly like it? No, of course not. It's about being fun, loose, kind of my own style, right? Notice I am not using a Sharpie. My Sharpie said, hey, I don't want to work right now, so I have been having some trouble with Sharpies lately, just wanting to quit on me, and it's kind of frustrating. And it seems like it's the newer Sharpies that are doing it. I, I don't know why, but cool. All right, so here you go. It's looking pretty awesome. Feel free to ask any questions, comments, thoughts. Do you— do you guys— do— does anybody like lighthouses? If you have a lighthouse, do you have a favorite one? Um, I'd love to know what you are working on. What are you creating these days? And it doesn't have to be artwork. Are you doing something creative? And that create— and that creativity can be different things to different people, right? I'm going to pop some orange on here. I need to do something creative at least once a day. It just— it's what fires my brain. It kind of makes me feel alive when I'm in creative mode. I don't know if that sounds weird, but— Oh, that is orange, my friends. But you know what, I don't really mind it. I kind of— I like the pop, the pops of color. I'm gonna throw some of that in the sky. I'm not digging that cloud there so much, so we're just gonna blot it out a little bit. There we go. I think that's better. I just want to soften that up. Did I attend the patron sessions with Rue? Trying to remember. Yeah, Rue. That's right. Rue had some Patreon sessions. That's I forgot about that. Um, yeah, I think I was on. I did watch a few of them. That was a while ago. Yeah, it was pretty fun. I actually went to a live workshop with Rue. Oh my gosh! 3 years ago? I can't remember if it was like 3 years ago or 4. Um, he was teaching a class, man, I'm drawing a blank, but he was doing a workshop and I, I went to North Carolina and, uh, that's the first time I actually met him in person. I went to that workshop, it was really cool. Yeah, good question. Yeah, it was really fun. I got to hang, you know, spend some time with him and the The past few days. It was really just awesome, just kind of doing life together. And, um, just— I am just so blessed to, um, have, have him as a friend. So yeah, good question. All right guys, what do you think? This one might be almost done. I kind of like it. I don't want to overdo it. There's one thing I want to do after it dries. I want to throw down some chartreuse, um, color pencil on there. But I really, I really think this is gonna be done. Let me grab a mat. Do I have a mat here? Yeah, where'd I put my mats? Did I put them away? Here we go. I got some mats here. It's always fun to see what these would look like matted. I don't have the right size mat, but that's okay. I figure we'll pretend. So if we maybe crop a little area out. Ooh, what the heck? I actually like this. Let's see, let's, let's see how this looks cropped and matted. The sky's getting a little washed out by my light in here, so I'll tilt it up, maybe see if that's better. A little better. Uh, kind of like— I'm trying to find which— I think I like this I think I like it matted this way. What do you think? Let me know in the comments. Do you like the way that looks? Right here's the whole thing. Ta-da! And if I just crop some of it out, I kind of like the lighthouse a little off-center. I'm thinking maybe somewhere in there. Sally says lovely. Thank you, Sally. I appreciate that. Yeah, let me turn that light off. Let's see, does that look better? Um, still getting a little washed out up here, but I think it's kind of better with that light off. Yeah, I like it. I likey likey. Although now I need that light on so I can see what I'm doing. Cool, right? So yeah, so it's been fun just doing something different, stepping outside of my comfort zone. You know, buildings and I are like this. Is that the expression? Um, before, like this. Landscapes and I are kind of like this. But I want to do more landscapes. I think as an architect, it's important I can do landscapes. As an artist, I just want to do landscapes and just capture them in kind of my style. And the only way to do that is by practice, practice, practice. Trying to think. I don't know. I don't think this needs any. I don't think it needs anything else. Becky says, "I agree with your cropping choice." Hey, thank you. Hey, Jeff's in the house. Hey Jeff, how are you? Good to see you, man. So you guys are liking the cropped here to the right. Awesome. I'm just gonna do something a little cuckoo-ish. I'm gonna crop a vertical sliver. No, it's got to be horizontal. I have this big, big honking frame here, but it's not going to really help. Push that up. Push it that way. You know, if I kind of cropped it, I could find a black piece of paper somewhere. But do that. If I kind of framed it, cha-ching! Sorry, guys. Let's see. I'm gonna see if I can find a black. Piece of paper. Actually, I can use this edge here. Let's remove this. I can make some room. Bada boom, bada bam. All right, we're gonna make some room here. Let's do it the right way. Let's put this here. Getting a little fussy. And then let's just throw this here like it has a thingy on top. Let's pretend that actually works. So, you know, it could also be cropped kind of like this. A little more sky. Again, this is just being washed out because of the light, the light in the area. So do you like the bigger frame or do you like the smaller frame? I'm curious. So this is the big frame and then the smaller frame is just Kind of cropping this. Oops, crop it like there. Let me know. Uh, tomorrow I have the opportunity— I'm going to be going sketching tomorrow for a couple hours and A place I have never been. Not— it's not too far from here, and, uh, it'll be fun. So I'll check in tomorrow maybe, or Saturday, and I'll show you guys what I do there at that place. I can't believe school is not that far away. This summer has blown by way too fast. Way, way too fast, but it's been a good summer, so no complaints. I'm gonna throw some chartreuse on here. Uh, Sally says the bigger. Awesome. Laura says bigger. You guys like the bigger frame better? That's interesting. You need 2L pieces of mat to make adjustable for different sketch sizes. Yeah, Becky, that's a great idea. So if I just cut 2Ls, I can I get it. I could kind of slide— oh, I'm trying to do it. I am not coordinated. I know what you're talking about. I can't model it with my fingers. Yeah, like 2 L's. I'm not even gonna try it. So I can slide them and change the opening. That's awesome suggestion. Thank you so much. Yes, I'm not that coordinated, as you could tell. I'm surprised you guys said the bigger one. That's interesting. I— my My brain was going with the smaller one, as well as me liking the smaller one better. So that's fun to hear. Yeah, thank you guys for your feedback. It's always fun for me to know what you're all thinking. You're all, you're all thinking what you're all thinking. I'm just laying some chartreuse on here a little bit. One of my fave colors. So Becky, you have me thinking about that Statue of Liberty postcard. I might—I think I'm gonna might use it as inspo for sketching. That'd be really cool. All right, that's enough. I don't want to overdo it. Ta-da! So what I want is nice too. I am a Gemini. I am a Gemini. Gemini's the twins, right? Here you go. I'm gonna hold it up close so you can see some of the details. You guys are silly. Pretty cool. I think this is gonna hit the Facebook page. Um, thinking in my brain, do I just— so I— do I throw a price on it or do I put it out for bidding? Hmm, I think I'm just gonna put a price out there and maybe say first, uh, first to say I want it or Sold or something. I don't know. We'll get it. So I think we'll do that a little bit later or tonight, or if not tonight, tomorrow morning. Yeah, this has been fun. So thank you for watching me follow along with this journey. I didn't, I didn't film this from the beginning, so you kind of caught it in the last, the last part of it, which I think, um, was a fun part to watch for sure. Pretty cool. And We'll just kind of do a comparison. Let's see kind of where my— I just like to see where I've started from and where I'm headed, right? So we kind of go— we have these. Zoom out, zoom out please. I wish I could talk to my camera and say zoom out and it would just zoom out. That would be fun. I'm sure there's a way to voice activate it. All right, so we got a couple different ones here. Cool idea. Hey, thanks Becky. Yeah, you inspired it. I'll, um, I'm gonna bring— I'm gonna break that postcard out before we leave. I'll just pull it down here and put it on camera. It's pretty cool. Another one, right? You can see very similar color palette, very similar ideas with Sharpie, gel pen, um, the rugged jagged shoreline, 2 different lighthouses. And then this is— this actually goes vertical this way. I'm gonna grab something quick before I head out and I'll show you guys. All right, all right, here. So, um, here's kind of wrapped it up. I just want to show you this really cool— we're going to go all the way from the coast of Maine to, hmm, New York City. To New York, New York City. All right. Um, here's a really cool postcard, so shout out to Becky. I really love it. Um, check this out, different pieces of the Statue of Liberty. This is so— this is so awesome. You know, we have part of the torch happening, uh, the feet. And I like it because you get a sense of scale because you have a person standing here next to it, right? Let me zoom in, probably be better. Oh, there you go. You guys can see it better. It's pretty cool, isn't it? You know, we're so used to seeing Statue of Liberty as a completed piece. Here we can see it broken down. Pretty amazing. So shout out. And, uh, this I'm definitely gonna use this as a sketch and maybe we'll do it on the next livestream. We'll kind of just use this as inspiration. Um, and that brings me to how I want to close the show. Let me break this out. Sorry if my— I'm in the way. There we go. All right. So, you know, I have this really cool sketch framework, um, something I've developed. I love it. The SKETCH™ framework. Anyway, just wanna talk about the S, stay curious. So you're making a shift, a mind shift from nothing's ordinary to everything is worth exploring. Sketch what catches your eye. It unlocks permission to sketch ordinary things. Basically, keep seeing the world in a curious, childlike sense of wonder. And this is a really great example. We're so used to seeing the Statue of Liberty finished, but now we kind of look at it differently, right? We've never really thought about it. I've never really thought about it from this point of view. So that's just kind of staying curious and looking at things in different ways. All right, I appreciate you watching live and commenting. This is amazing. If you're watching the live stream, I appreciate you as well. If you're on YouTube, please, please hit that thumbs up. Button. It's huge. It really does help. I want to spread positivity through creativity, and you could help me. We can do it together just by hitting that thumbs up. And if you haven't subscribed yet to my Facebook, please subscribe. If you haven't, you know, followed me there on Facebook or Instagram, please. I'd love to have you guys on this journey with me. Being creative and just kind of sketching things and seeing the world a little differently. Until next time, sketch boldly, live creatively, and embrace imperfection. Oh my God.