Monday Chill and Sketch

Hey, happy Monday, September 22nd, 2025. I'm Jason Nicholas Nicholas with The Inkspired Life, where I love sketching. Architecture, urban sketching, and just sketching anything in general. Um, sketching for me serves a lot of different purposes. Not only is it great for stimulating creativity, it's great for capturing the world around me, processing things. Um, it's kind of therapeutic. It helps me to escape sometimes. So sketching is really an awesome tool that has transformed me and transforms me in so many different ways. So if you're just joining me, I'd love to know where you're watching from tonight. Put it in the comments. It'd be so cool to know where you're watching from, as always. So I'm gonna do a few things tonight. Um, one is I want to do a quick sketchbook tour. I was in New York City this past Saturday doing some sketching, so I'll show you some of the things I did. Um, while I was out and about, talk about how I like to process the city around me and capture things quickly. Um, I also want to show you probably one of my favorite, um, sketches to date so far in this cool little Moleskine Concertina journal. So I'll be revealing what's in here. Um, one of my faves so far to date. And then I think we'll just maybe— I feel like just adding maybe some color, maybe some ink washes to what I have in the sketchbook here. All right, so thanks for joining me on the Inkspired Life. Let's start with the sketchbook tour. I was in New York City this past Saturday for a workshop by Charlie Can Sketch. He is an awesome person, great, great sketcher. He's an architect as well. And when I went into the city for the workshop, I got there really early, so I walked around and was doing a lot of sketching. So let me just show you some of the things I captured, um, in my— this is my cool Lockbie field journal. Love using this, take it pretty much everywhere I go to capture, just capture moments. Let me zoom in. Cool. All right, so when I'm wandering around New York City, uh, I tend to be a very fast sketcher. I don't stay in one spot for too long. I've— I'm always on the go, and which is cool because it challenges me to be able to get things down just kind of quick. So my style is loose, fast, very, very sketchy. So I'll show you some of the things I captured, and they may not make sense to you, and that's, that's okay, because really what I'm sketching here is, is for me. It's a way for me to document, document my day, kind of capture what I saw, that not only visually but the, the sense of place and the energy. New York City for me has a lot of energy, so my lines have a lot of quick— they're just very quick, uh, very, very loose. So we'll look through some of these, I'll talk about them a little bit. Hey DB, awesome to see you over on the Facebook. Hope all is well. So, so great to see you. We, uh, we need to catch up. I think the Inklings, we all need to have a Zoom get-together soon. So this is a quick, this is a quick capture of a, a skybridge that is in the Chelsea area, just connecting two buildings together. This I had to sketch really, really fast because I was walking on the High Line. The High Line is a really cool public park system that has— it was an old elevated railway that's been converted to this this astonishing, incredible park system. So I was walking along the High Line, and the particular spot where you could see this, the view of this bridge, it's pretty narrow, pretty, pretty tight. Um, so as I was sitting there trying to sketch, I literally had people bumping into me. I had this, this guy take his camera, he was like right in front of my face. Um, there was a lot of hustle and bustle to capture this view. So I really— my goal here was I just wanted to get this bridge down quick. But what's really fun is this sketching, this left an imprint here in my brain. So I remember the moment, I remember the, you know, the situation, I remember, you know, the people bumping into me. So it helps to lock, lock me in, into the moment. By capturing it with paper. Um, this is a sketch looking across at Pier 57. This is a Pier 57 building kind of here. This is a building in the background. This is either other cool buildings in the background. You'll see a different sketch, um, here. I really, really I was trying to practice sketching without looking at the page too much. So it's just kind of looking at the shapes I was seeing and putting pen to paper and just kind of sketching. Um, yes, sketching by looking at the subject rather than the page. So I captured here, um, all these sketches you're seeing were done with ballpoint pens. I'm loving using ballpoint pens now. I've kind of gone back to that. Uh, they're fairly inexpensive, easy to carry. I'll show you here, you can see in my Lockbie folio, boom, I have some right there I carry with me. Uh, this is a cool pen here too, it's a multicolor pen. It's also a lead holder built into it. So there you go, so that's kind of that sketch. This is Little Island in New York City. Little Island used to be a pier. It's been converted to this really cool elevated park. Let me just break out some color and I can show you what I'm talking about. I'll just sketch right on top of it. I'm just going to use this color right here. So Little Island is made up of these kind of these— they're almost like, um, concrete pods that are almost— they're almost shaped like tulips. If anybody's watching, you might know the actual flower that they're based off of. It might be tulips, but they're kind of shaped like these. Um, if I was— this, this is the scale of a person here in relation to what we're looking at. So that's a person, these are the structures. So it's pretty high It's elevated, there's landscaping, there's trees growing up in here. You can walk all around this park. It's a really amazing, uh, example of just using an existing space and recreating into something new. So it's called Little Island. I've been there a few times. I love this area. I could hang out here all day and just sketch. Those are kind of what the pods the, uh, tulip pods look like, that kind of shape. Hey, DB says your quick sketches always catches the view. Oh, thank you so much. That's my goal, just to capture what I'm seeing. Um, here's, here's a skyline. I'm sure I didn't skip a page. So from that little island area There's a view of One World Trade Center, aka the Freedom Tower. So this is at the 9/11 memorial site here, the area where the, you know, the tragedy of 2001, 9/11 happened. The Twin Towers destroyed, lives, lives lost. You know the story, it's really sad. Um, this is One World Trade, that's in that location, new, you know, one of the newest buildings, and I just wanted to capture that in the skyline. I'm planning on going back there, I don't know, next week maybe, or a couple weeks, just to the 9/11 Memorial. I just want to really hang out there for 3 or 4 or 5 hours and kind of soak in the area. Uh, just from another sketch of Little Island, just a different view. You can kind of see those tulip-shaped structures there. These were pretty interesting shaped buildings. Let me— let's pull out another color. I'm just going to highlight the outline so you can see it on screen better. Yeah, we'll use orange. We'll just grab some orange. We'll grab and go. These buildings, I don't know the name of this building. Has a couple pieces. I should look it up, but it's really cool. It's actually, it's at an angle, so if you're looking at it, it's not vertical like this. It is literally leaned over, so it's really interesting construction. And again, I don't really— I don't know the name of it. It's something I want to look, look up. And that's the cool thing about kind of wandering around your areas, your cities, your towns, um, you'll notice things that you haven't seen before, and it might raise curiosity. And, you know, it's encouraging me now to kind of look this up, do a little more research. What is this building? Why is it built that way? Um, just by paying attention to our surroundings, um, we kind of notice different things. It's all— it's so easy to get lost in the daily grind and have our blinders on So we're just seeing kind of straight ahead, or more, more so nowadays we're looking down at our phones while we're walking, when there is a whole world to be discovered right in front of our eyes. Slow down, pay more attention, and you'll notice some cool stuff. So you can kind of see the frame of the building. I just I just put in orange there just so it would pop out a little bit. So I remember, I think the buildings are actually white. Uh, and then these sketches are from the Chelsea area. I love, I love the Chelsea area in New York City. So, uh, some, just some perspective views looking down some of the streets. Here's one view. Maybe we'll mess with this sketch tonight. This one's pretty blank. Here's another view of a street view perspectives again, kind of, kind of coming down to a focal point. Just had a really cool— maybe I had the color. We're just going to break out some chartreuse. Love me some chartreuse, guys. I always like to say I didn't know what chartreuse was a few years ago, but once I discovered the color, I'm loving it. It's this really cool greenish color. So that back there is— that's a water tower kind of in the background. I'm starting to add people in sketches more and more just because I really like— I like how adding people gives a sense of the scale of what we're looking at. Here's another street view. I'll just bring it closer so you can see it a little more detail. Another perspective, uh, this, this is one I started but it was running out of time so I didn't really get far with it. But this actually gives you just a kind of a sense of how how, um, I was trying to lay out the perspective on here. It's a two-point, meaning this comes back to a point here and this side comes back to a point. So, you know, maybe we'll mess with this. We'll just create something imaginary out of this sketch since we already have it there. So this is a quick show and tell. Those are some of the sketches I did when I was out and about Saturday in the city. Um, I have a really cool story. So I've been carrying— I've been doing these, uh, torch sketches and giving them out. I love giving them out. And I actually had this with me, and I had an Empire State Building sketch, same size paper. And as I was sketching in Chelsea, um a gentleman, uh, from the Ukraine came up to me and he was interested in what I was doing, asked if he could see my, my sketch, and I said of course. And we chatted, and it turns out his father was an architect. Um, this gentleman works in the IT business, but he loves sketching. He used— he, um, did a lot of building sketching, urban sketching Uh, he lives— I think I said he's from the Ukraine. Um, but when, uh, you know, war broke out there, he stopped sketching buildings. He couldn't get outside, you know, he was afraid to go outside, and he started to sketch people. So I love that he was able to transform and kind of pivot his love of sketching from one subject to another. He didn't stop it, he just transformed it or changed it. So that was a really interesting, um, takeaway for me. So real nice, uh, gentleman, and it was really cool just being able to connect with someone from Ukraine over sketching, right? So who, who would have thought? So it was a really cool experience. I've given these away to There's a donut place in, uh, near Rockefeller Center. I've given this sketch a couple— a version of this sketch out to a guy that works there. He was so grateful. Um, yeah, and people on the bus I've given this to, students. I've given sketches out to students now. It's fun to connect with them. Hey Jennifer! Jennifer, cheers! How are you? How are— how is Lake Tahoe? It's great to see you. I know I'm talking a lot, guys. I haven't been on in a while, so I am, I am in babble mode. I'm going to do some sketching in a minute. I wanted to show you— where did I put it? Oh yeah, I want to show you my favorite sketch to date that I have right now. And I've shown this before, but I'm going to bring it out again because I just think it's so cool. I love this Statue of Liberty Sketch. I love the colors, I love the scale of it. It's just such a fun piece. It's in the— my Concertina Sketchbook, so it could fold up. Um, it's mixed media, has ink, uh, what does that one— has ink, Creative Marker on it, um, Sharpie markers on it. Ballpoint pen, and there's even some oil pastel on here too. So this is just a really, really fun sketch. Pretty cool, right? All right, enough show and tell. I'm jibber-jabbering. Let me know if you guys have questions, comments, or thoughts. Hello to all my Instagram viewers, great to see you guys watching on the Insta. Hope you're doing well, it's always great to see you. Cool stuff. All right, let's work on a sketch. So I think I'm just going to riff off of this kind of unfinished drawing that I started here. Let's just kind of turn it into something and we'll use kind of from my imagination, so not based on anything specific. And I have, I have good news. I'm actually really excited. Yeah, I'm a good— I'm a geek. I'm gonna nerd out on this for a minute. And I can't remember who to give the credit to, but someone on Instagram let me know that my favorite ink color was back in stock from Birmingham Pen Company. Apple Snail. Oh yeah, um, I've been milking this bottle for, I don't know, a couple years maybe, because they stopped making it. But it's back, and I can tell you where some of my money went to. I bought a few bottles. So Let's break out some Apple Snail ink. I love this stuff. I've missed it. My favorite ink color. Got a bamboo brush. I have some dirty water. Pro tip: I love using dirty water. It's just, uh, especially for gritty industrial kind of sketches, adds a cool atmosphere. DB says, I really like the folded out drawing. Hey, I, I appreciate that. It is pretty awesome. All right, can you guys see this okay? Give me a thumbs up or say, hey, I can see it. Uh, Instagram guys, I know I think my image kind of gets cut off a little, so if you're on Instagram, say hi in the comments so I know you can see me— or not see me, but see my sketch. And you can hear me okay? Love that. London, if you're out there, hey, great to see you. I don't know if you're still watching. Hope all is well. All right, I am listening to some music. You know me, I need to have my music on. All right, this is Apple Snail, guys. We're just going to go for him. So the paper in here, in this Lockbie Field Journal, is kind of thin. It's not really meant for heavy, heavy washes. You'll notice the paper buckling up, so I'm throwing it on there a little too, um, too wet, but that's okay. And I normally like to sketch or add ink and watercolor at an angle so it runs down the page. So let me just prop this up. Hopefully you guys can still see that okay. I think that's enough on there for now. Let me flip this, flip this. Oh my gosh, I am not flipping the ink, I'm putting the cap on it. Actually, if I flip the ink, that would be kind of messy. Yes, my brain's tired, so I'm back in teaching mode. I think we're starting, uh, what is this, our second full week Um, third— I lost track already. I love, love, love teaching, but it, it just, it makes my brain tired in a good way. Let's break out some Sharpie creative markers. Just gonna throw a bunch of colors down here and grab some. Again, we're just— guys, we're just having fun tonight. I am not doing anything particular. I honestly just wanted to come on, say hello. It's been a long time. Throw some color down instead of eating snacks because I'm really hungry. I forget I sketch. All right. That's no bueno. Um, I love the way this Apple Snail ink is drying. It looks really, really cool. Hey, Eagle Scout Kiko, what is up, Kiko? How are you, man? Kiko's over there on the Insta. All right, I'm gonna zoom in so you guys can see this. I think this will be more cool. Let me zoom in. I really want to get close up. All right, I love this Apple Snail Ink color. It is like, think when you bite into an apple, you leave it sitting there and it turns that kind of brownish color, right? That's what this is. It's almost like a caramel color. I love it, but I love it especially next to this Aqua. This color combo is probably— I'm gonna, I'm gonna put it out there and I think I'm gonna say this is my favorite color combination right here. You heard it first, right here on The Inspired Life. So guys, I want to do a sketching workshop. If you have any suggestions, let me know. What would you like to sketch along with me? Should we do barns? I'm trying to find a topic that I can get a lot of interest in. I know DB— DB is ready for a workshop. So DB, I want to bring something your way. Let me know, let me know, DB, if you're out there. What is something you would like to sketch? Because I think I want to— I want to do something that you want to do. You deserve it. Uh, one of the things I like about Sharpie Creative Markers is they dry really quick. I'm looking for a black Sharpie. All right, let's just sketch maybe some windows on this building. I've been having, um, I've been having some bad luck with my Sharpies lately. I don't know what's going on, but they, they seem like they're drying so quickly. Like, I mean, the ink in the pen here is just— the marker is, it's like drying out, and I'm not sure why. Really strange, and it's been happening a lot. You can see that. Anyway, so I'm throwing some windows on this building. The windows aren't precise, they're not beautiful rectangles, and that's okay. I just want to create the idea, the illusion that there are some windows on this building. I'm not going for perfection, you know. Let's sketch some kind of— maybe this is some kind of old industrial building, so let's See, I'm gonna— I'm gonna actually see if I can find another Sharpie. I have tons of them here. Oh boy, the man is struggling. I got Sharpies in here. Hold on a sec. Sharpie, Sharpie. All right, just pulled out two. All right, let's imagine some kind of old industrial building. Maybe we got these big, uh, I love— here, let's see, this marker's pretty good. I love sliding doors like you would see on a barn. So maybe we got some kind of cool sliding door thing happening here on a track. So we've got a barn door there. So guys, I'm also, uh, I'm also, I'm live streaming on Facebook, my YouTube page, and Instagram all at the same time. So if you're on Insta and you can't see the whole image, uh, think about switching over to Facebook or YouTube. Um, you can find me at The Inkspired Life on either of those, and I'd love for you to follow me, especially on YouTube. I want to get that— I want to get that subscriber number up to 1,000. All right, so maybe we have some kind of door here on this building. I like going back over this, uh, some of the areas after they dry with my Sharpie, pull out some details perhaps on there. What else we got happening? Maybe we have— you know, I'm going to turn this into a— I don't know, sorry, on Instagram I don't know if you can see this. Maybe we got some kind of a chimney back in here on this part of the building. We'll make it round shaped. There you go, pretty cool, right? I'm going to zoom out so you can see this more. I want it so the Insta people can see it as well. So it's starting to take shape, right? Throwing down some windows on there, threw a door on there, added a chimney in the background, some color. I think you can maybe see some kind of a building. Again, I'm picturing an industrial building. Maybe it was a factory, maybe it was a warehouse, maybe it was a factory warehouse. We see what I did, we combined them there. Um, I think, I think this was actually a church over here when I was originally sketching the building. I just love making this into my own kind of imaginary place. Put a little cap up there on the building. So I think you can see more of it now. All right, let's add some color to this door. Let's make it pop. You, you guys that have watched me before, you kind of— I think you know what color I definitely need to add to this at some point, but let's do it now. I'm gonna wrap, I'm gonna wrap in about 5 minutes. Not like, not rap like music, but wrap up. Um, yeah, neon pink. I'm still using it, still one of my go-tos. Just like to add some accents here and there with it. It's, um, it adds a sense of whimsy and just a cool little pop of color. Oh, I just snapped and that hurt. All right, and I'm going to zoom in on this. I'll pan around so you guys can all see what I'm adding on here so you get a better sense of it. And it's kind of hard right now to see it. All right, so we got some pink on there, and again, I'm just going to touch it and just going to put it in like 3 places. Cool. All right, let me zoom in. I'll pan around, you can see what I'm, what I'm talking about. We'll start over here so you can kind of see, see the chimney happening there. I like their that there's really just a simple— some splashes of color. I might add a little more, but not too much. I do think I want to pop that door out with a color. I'm picturing yellow, maybe. And I'll go to the side. You can kind of get a good close-up of that ink color as it's drying. And you can see how I had my book at an angle because all the ink was kind of running down. It's still wet, so you can see it dripping down there, right? All right, zoom in on the door. We'll pop in some color there and we'll wrap up. Let me know if you have any questions or comments, whether you're watching on the, on the Facebook or the YouTube or the Instagram. I just had to put the in front of all those. Why not? All right, I think I'm going to use neon yellow color pencil for this. I'm just going to my playlist. I want to go back a couple songs. All right, cool. I feel like I need a little bit of texture. Um, maybe we have— I don't know, maybe we'll do some stonework at the base of this industrial building. That's kind of what my imagination is picturing. There you go. I kind of— I really like that stonework. It looks, uh, I think it adds some detail there. Looks fire. Thank you, London, for your comment. I appreciate that, and congratulations, I think. I think you guys won today. I could be wrong, but congrats to you. That's awesome. Yeah, cool. So thank you so much. Yeah, I love that stonework, right? If you notice how I drew the stonework, I didn't do this. Let me go grab some scrap paper. I didn't do this for the stonework. I didn't sit there and draw every single little stone. Yeah, you can definitely do it that way. I did what I call, um, not what I— I didn't make this up, but it's a continuous line. So I like to draw my stones as almost a continuous line where I'm not really picking up the marker here, or the pen or pencil. So that's the difference. This is, this is my style, that kind of continuous line versus drawing them individually. And that's— I think you get a really cool kind of look with that. What else do I want to add here? I feel like I need to do something here in the kind of the ground area, so let's throw, let's throw, uh, something on there. I'm gonna zoom out a little bit. Again, if you're watching on Insta, sorry you can't see the entire image. Uh, feel free to go to my YouTube or Facebook where you can see the entire thing, but I appreciate you watching. I don't know, maybe we have some kind of like a driveway entrance or something happening here leading up to this door. Maybe got something like that going on. Maybe it's, uh, maybe it's an old abandoned factory. Let's just draw some— I like to call these growies. Growies are like grasses or weeds growing up along the face of the building here. It's a really cool way to anchor your building to the landscape. Um, I could put on— I can add color if I want. I can do them with chartreuse if I want, just kind of scribble stuff in a little bit. So it looks kind of like it's stuff growing on there. Boom. I want to add some texture, but this ink is still too wet up here, so I can't do that right now. So when you're sketching— when I'm sketching buildings, I'm thinking layers, I'm thinking big shapes. Going from big shapes, um, here's how I usually start. Typically I'll start with a roof. I'll start with the big shapes. I usually work from the top down, so I'll start with the roof, main part of the building, and the base of the building, and then the ground area. Then I'll come back and I'll add some details on the building like windows and doors. And then I'll add the materials like stonework or wood siding. Maybe, maybe what I'm actually picturing is I think this will be metal clad, a metal clad building. Think old industrial metal buildings, almost like shipping container type of material, um, on this part of the facade here. Actually, I'll try to sketch some of that in. I'll sketch some of that in right now. Hey, good to see you guys on Facebook. Thank you for watching. I don't think we have any YouTube— YouTubers out there tonight. What the heck? If you're watching from on YouTube, just say hi or something so I know. That it's even working on YouTube. So I'm drawing vertical lines to help wrap some metal siding on the building. And this chimney in the background, I think I'm going to add some, uh, maybe it's a stone, maybe it's a stone chimney. Uh, pro tip, I would, I would add my color pencil probably towards the end because once you throw down color pencil, I can't really sketch on top of it, so my Sharpie won't really draw on the waxy color pencil. There you go. Pretty cool, right? So I think you can see as I'm adding some different materials, it's really starting to take even more of a personality on 9:14. I think I'm gonna wrap in about— I think I said that 10 minutes ago I was gonna finish. I just love doing this, so I get carried away. This is— I'm like in a state of zen right now. Just, I'm in a really good place. It's always fun having people watch. Feel free to ask questions, guys, or, um Give comments. I'd love to answer some questions before I end today. I love, I love this song. I can't play the music because it's copyrighted and I don't want to get in trouble, so you guys can't hear it. Oh man, this is so wicked. I'm going to zoom in. I love what just happened. I'm geeking out on colors, I know. I'm loving this. This is called, uh, Sunburst Yellow. I just love it next to this Apple Snail ink. I love this edge. That looks really amazing. Gonna break out some red. And I'm going to add some shadows on here. I'm actually using red to do the hatch, hatch lines for the shadows. I love me some Fall Out Boy. Good stuff. That is fun sketching music. Bang! Oh, look at that. Cool. Loving this. I think we're in the home stretch. All right, last song I'm listening to and I'm wrapping it up. We'll go by the song. I'm going to zoom out so you guys can see the overall. Just want to add some of this This is, um, this is called Sky Blue Light. Almost looks like a silvery color, which I thought would look kind of cool here. Alright, let's zoom out. Alright, so you can get a sense of the overall, you know, maybe this building continues I like to, um, let my buildings bleed off. So let me just— we're just going to kind of continue this line a little bit here so it looks like the building continues. Oh, that's a Sharpie. That's a Sharpie. It doesn't want to play nice. We'll just grab this. We'll use the red. On here. I mean, the building just continues off a little bit like that. This would look really cool with a frame. Oh man, I think I left my— I think I left my black mat in school, my black mat frame. Oh wait, I got a backup. Let's check it out. All right, cool. I just threw kind of a mat on here, see what it would look like finished. I don't know, I don't know, I don't think it's the right size, um, frame opening. I kind of actually like when I did the vertical and just cut the building a little bit. That's not too bad. Maybe, maybe something like that would look cool, some kind of vertical frame. Yeah, that— I actually like that framing of it. All right, let's zoom in. You can see the details as I work my way out here tonight, out of here. You can get a sense of just my loose scribbly style. Lines on top of lines, kind of a little bit chaos happening, but I like— I actually, I really like it. That, that Apple Snail ink is— it's fire. Look at that. Love how it's drying. Hey Jenny Penny, hope you're doing well. Great to see you on Instagram. Check out the— look at the, um, this is called a hard edge. Look at how the ink's drying. I love hard edges. I think it adds a lot of character to it. So let me know if you're watching, do you think I captured kind of an old kind of industrial vibe with this sketch? Again, this is just from, from my imagination tonight. And you can see where that sky light, sky blue I think it is, that color pencil almost has a silvery color. I really like the way it looks. Pretty awesome. Hey guys, thank you, thank you so much for watching. I appreciate it. It's been a while. I have just been so busy and so tired at night and haven't, haven't really made the time to come on live and do sketching. And I'm so So glad I did tonight. Um, I wish I could be disciplined and do this at a regular schedule. Um, well, I guess I could be disciplined and do it at a regular schedule. I would just have to do it. So let me know in the comments, uh, thumbs up, hearts, all that cool stuff if you like this. I would love to know your feedback. It just kind of gives me energy. I want to know what I'm doing, and I want to know how I can help and serve you in your creative world. If you have any questions or need any pro tips, let me know. I'm happy to share, um, what I know. I don't know everything, I don't know a lot, but I'll share what I know. You guys are awesome. I'm Jason Nicholas Nicholas with the Inkspired Life, where I love sketching, sketching architecture, urban sketching, and just capturing the world around me one line out of time. Until next time, sketch boldly, live creatively, and inspire endlessly. All right guys, feel free to reach out, leave me comments and all that fun stuff. See you soon.