The Inkspired Life - Sketching & Painting : Inking Out Loud
In this 45‑minute live stream, artist‑educator Jason Nicholas returns to his YouTube channel after a two‑week hiatus to sketch a loosely interpreted view of the Metropolitan Museum’s entrance. He works primarily with Sharpies, then layers purple, turquoise, neon pink, and yellow using Pilot, Lamy, Flair pens, and watercolor brushes, explaining his unconventional approach to shadows—using color rather than just gray. Throughout the session he chats with viewers (Jody, Chip, Linda, Luis), shares personal updates about a demanding teaching schedule, a recent 3‑day irrigation repair, and the upcoming school wrap‑up. Jason showcases a 3‑D‑printed custom ink tray he designed in CAD, describing the design iterations, tolerances, and printing time, linking it to his classroom teaching of CAD and 3D printing. He promotes his Facebook page, encourages subscriptions to reach a 400‑subscriber goal, and previews a series of urban sketches of New York landmarks (Guggenheim, Empire State, Brooklyn Bridge, etc.) that he plans to sell during a summer NYC trip. The stream blends informal instruction, artistic philosophy about quick, loose rendering of classical architecture, community interaction, and modest self‑promotion.
Chapters
Hey, hello out there if you're watching. Happy, uh, Sunday. Hope you're doing well. I'm just on for a few minutes doing— I haven't sketched online in maybe 2 weeks. I don't know, it's been a while. I've been so crazy busy, so tired at night that I have not been coming on and sketching. So hopefully you're watching and hopefully you're enjoying this. This sketch is loosely, loosely based on the Metropolitan Museum in New York City. So it's very, very loosely based on it. Um, yeah, so I'll sketch for a few minutes. Let me know if any question or comments. I can't see comments, so if you are commenting, I love that. Um, I see some people watching. I don't know if my comments are not working or you are just quiet, and quiet is okay. It's no problem. Yeah, I'm gonna check some settings because I haven't been on in a while and I may— there may have been an update on here that changed some settings. If you are watching, if someone could say a comment, be cool just to see if this is working. I am puzzled, but that's okay. I'm going to just keep going forward and, uh, yeah, you guys are awesome. So I've missed sketching. We are 2 weeks, 2 weeks away from school ending. So we are in the home stretch, which is pretty awesome. And it's gonna go fast the next 2 weeks, I have a feeling. We actually are, we have a day off tomorrow. We got some snow days back this year that we didn't use. So I am very appreciative of our board for giving us some snow days back. So it's really nice to have an extra day tomorrow. It's a much-needed extra day. So yeah, this is loosely based on the Metropolitan Museum, New York City, kind of the entry area steps going up into it. Really cool building. Very classical design, very symmetrical. And I think I'm just going to do this black and white for now. I don't know if I'm going to add any color, probably not tonight. Let's just, uh, just doing some Sharpie sketching. You guys know I love my Sharpies. Hey Jody, I see your comment. Yes, comments are working on the YouTube side of things. That's cool. Hope you're doing well. Where have you been? Haven't seen you in a while. I know, I've been just crazy. I've been so tired at night. I can't tell you how much school wears me out. In a good way. I love school. Love teaching. Best thing I've ever done. But it's so tiring. So I've just been so tired at night I haven't been sketching live. I've been sketching, but it's great to be here. If you hear a strange sound in the background, I actually have my 3D printer going, so I'm 3D printing something. You might hear some sounds going on back there. That's what's going— that's what you hear. And if it finishes, I'll show you. I don't think it's gonna finish. It looks like it has been an hour. An hour and a half left to go. But I designed a real simple box, something I could fit these inks into right here. So I have a bunch of these inks and I just designed a box that I could put them into and I can easily just take that box, pick it up, move it around. So that's what, that's what's 3D printing. You know what I do want to throw in here? I do want to throw some gray on here. Let's just let's make some gray shadows. Instead of gray, I actually think I want to get them— I'm inking out loud, just kind of winging it here. I feel like creating purple shadows. Yeah, let's make some purple shadows on here. Why not? So I could use a— I have— I could bleed some purple ink. From my preppy pen, wherever it is. I have a purple preppy somewhere. Perhaps my purple preppy is somewhere. Hmm. Alright, so I'm just gonna bleed some. I have a purple Pilot pen. Hey peeps, I have a purple Pilot pen. I'm gonna bleed some purple ink from this Pilot pen. See how that goes. I, uh, this comment thing is driving me bizarre. I'm actually gonna, let me log in. Just logging into Facebook for a sec on my computer. This page isn't available. Why not? Must log in to Facebook. Logging into Facebook. Alright, here we go. That was my Captain Kirk. Must log in to Facebook. Let's see. Bum bum bum bum bum bum bum. Oh, alright, it says there are no comments on the Facebook side of things. That's okay, no worries. I just saw myself on Facebook, that was weird. Alright, I'm back. You guys are awesome, feel free to comment. So here we go, let's bleed some purple ink. Let me just grab, uh, we'll just use an aqua brush tonight. We'll just bleed some of this. I have an Aqua Brush ready to go. So I'm just going to bleed some purple in here just to make some shadows on this glass area. See what it looks like. There we go. Oops. Yikes. This is a new, uh, this is a new Aqua Brush. It's not broken in yet. So I squeezed a little hard there and got the water out. Now my music stopped. Oh, I hear it now. The man is having tech issues. Alright. Here we go. I'm just throwing down some of this Purple Pilot— I'm sorry, Purple, uh, Prep— oh my gosh. Yeah, I'm tired. As you can tell, my brain is tired. Flair, this is a Flair pen right here, purple Flair pen. I think I said Preppy before. All right, cool. This is fun. So sometimes we think when we're sketching shadows of things, it has to be black or gray. That's not true. Shadows can, Shadows are really made up of all different colors if you look closely at them. I like the way this purple's kind of looking here. This is a curved niche, or niche. So I just want to kind of give it kind of a curvy look. That's why the shadow's curving like this. And these are doors. I'm just gonna— see, I'm just gonna just throw some flare right here. We're just gonna pull some of that color straight down. And we have some columns happening over in here. Gonna try to give them just kind of an idea that they're curving, just like that niche, or niche. How many people say niche? Let me know if you say niche or niche. So it's kind of, kind of accentuate where these columns are coming down here. There's a few more in here as well. Hey, Chip's in the house! Chip, good to see you. Chip says, missed you, brother. I've missed you too, Chip. I hope all is well, man. We'll have to catch up one of these days. Hope you and your family are doing well. It's always great to see you. I'm, uh, I'm excited for our sketching adventure in, in August. That is going to be awesome. I better start practicing my urban sketching. It's going to be fun to go out and about in Princeton and do some sketching there. I haven't sketched in Princeton yet. So cool. All right, guys, so you can see I'm just throwing down some of this purple flare. Boom. Keeping this one kind of simple with colors. Let's throw some shadows on the stair here just to give some depth to it. Are these the colors that are really there? No. I'm just kind of painting with— inking here with what I feel like inking with. Let's pull this down a little bit. Here we go. It's kind of cool looking. I like it. Jody says, where can I find you on Facebook? Hey Jody, that's a great Great question. I should be at The Inkspired Life on Facebook. I'll put the, I'll put it in the chat right now. I will paste where you can find me on Facebook. Copying it right now. Throw it in the chat. Boom! I love this technology, it is so fun. So that is the link there where I am on Facebook, so feel free to, to go to Facebook if you're on there. You could follow my page, that would be cool. You can watch live streams there and on YouTube. It would be really cool. All right, let's, uh, I have a Lamy pen here. Let's break out the Lamy with some black Lamy ink. Just darken some lines, then we're going to wrap up in a few, probably like 5 minutes. I just want to use this, the Lamy. I want to pull out kind of these arches, give a little more depth. So we're going to be dark, kind of darken them because I want the windows to look kind of like they're recessed in from the face of where these columns are. So you may have noticed I really don't sketch classical buildings that much. And there's a reason. Classical buildings are so symmetrical. So I kind of— I hate to say this— I avoid them sometimes because I just feel like when I go to sketch a classical building, it's got to be more precise. I like quick, loose, wonky, fast. So it's just a mindset thing where Classical for me is balance, symmetry. I feel like I need to be more precise. Not true. I can make it quick and loose in my style. I just have to work on that mindset though. You know, sketching is not only about— it's not only about subject matters or the tools we use. It's also about creative mindset and how you're thinking about your subject, how you're approaching You know, what creative ways can you express what you're looking at when it comes to architecture? So you can see by throwing that Lamy ink down, it's black, it's dark, and it's just kind of pulling these, giving some depth to these shadows here a little bit. So I'm trying to, trying to show some recessed areas a little bit. Hopefully that makes sense. I know I'm probably like rambling. Welcome to the rambling Sketching Architect. Um, it's all good, I'm having fun. Hope you guys are having fun. I want to do some vertical lines on these stairs. Uh, we'll use— let's use the Pilot pen. And why do I sketch vertical lines? Just to give the illusion that these stairs are going up. I also have to be honest with you, my wrist is— my hand is killing me today. I've been working on my irrigation system, fixing some broken pipes. Trying to find valve box covers that are buried way beneath the surface of the ground. So I've been digging for the past 5 days straight or so, and I am feeling it. So if you see me kind of stopping and doing this with my hand, I'm just kind of trying to massage some of that stress out of it. There. It's hard, it's hard to hold the pen right now, but I love sketching and nothing's going to stop me. Just try and stop me. All right. Just gonna pull out the top of these kind of decorative, uh, ornaments on the roof, on the roof parapet here. Just to give a little definition to where the edge of that building is, just to pull it out. And I'll go over that with, with, uh, my pen here. Hey Linda, good to see you, hope all's well. Linda is in the house. Jody says no turquoise. Jody, just for you, for watching, I am going to break out the turquoise just for you. I appreciate you And I think— do I want to use turquoise watercolor or colored pencil? I'm not sure which one, which do I want to use? We'll do both. Yeah, let's bring out some turquoise and throw it here on the purple, see what it looks like, some watercolor. And then, uh, because it's— I can't really do the colored pencil stuff till it dries. All right, here we go. Boom, let's dig in. I'm going to open up— I have some— this water is really uber dirty and it's actually a green color, so I'm going to use that dirty water and use I want to use this. I love using this bamboo brush for watercolor. So we're going to get some purple and some turquoise— I mean, a green and turquoise mixed here. See, I got some on the paper here. It's all good. Can make like a copper patina look, probably. So, all right, let's do it. Let's throw some turquoise on here. It does need a little bit of brightness here. Cool, I like it. Awesome, thank you for this suggestion. Definitely needed that pop of color. Course, now that we have turquoise, now I'm thinking I need some yellow for that touch of fresh— freshness on here. Linda says, "Cuckoo, what is printing?" Oh yeah, Linda. Yeah, so I have my 3D printer running in the background. I can actually show you guys what I'm printing, hold up, because I made one earlier today. So give me a sec, I'll go grab what I— So I designed something online today. It's a simple box using CAD software. I'll go grab it and I'll show you what I made. We can talk a little bit about the design process. So here's what I made. Let me take some of these out. I don't want to spill them. Let me put these here. So basically I designed a box. Just a simple white plastic box. And the purpose of this box is to put— I have bottles of ink, so you guys can see like this. So I made this box, it's like a tray to put the inks in. That way I can put them on my desk, pick them up, move them. I see it up here if I hold the air. So here's a little design talk. Not a talk, but we'll talk about the design process for a sec. So I designed it and it's too wide. If you listen to this, there's too much wiggle room between the ink bottle and the inside of the tray. I want it to be tighter. So I went back and I redesigned it to make it— the tolerance tighter because I want a snug fit. Um, I could fit 6 in here across, and I had to shrink the length of it as well. It was a little too wide for 6 bottles, so I shrunk it down to make it snugger. And that is what's printing, so I'll let you guys know how it comes out. This took about 2.5 hours to print this box. 2.5 hours. So pretty cool. Actually, I'll put the inks in here and you can see them. So you can kind of see here I have the inks in this tray. Easy for me to pick, grab, and go. I used to keep all these right in front of me here. On the table and I couldn't see them. They were underneath, uh, where my drawing board is, so I wanted to move them onto a shelf. So that's what's printing. Good question. And this is nice. It is so nice. All right, let's throw some yellow on here and I'm gonna wrap up, guys. Let me know if you have any questions or comments. What's cool about the 3D printer is it makes random sounds. Sometimes it'll sound like a droid from Star Wars. Really interesting. I'm just grabbing some yellow. I'm gonna pop I'll punch some color on here. Cool. And again, I'm just on— doing my daily sketching. Just want to have a few minutes of sketch time before bed. This is fun. I like the way it's looking. So now we got some turquoise, we have some yellow. I'm going to blot some of that back with my paper towel. Don't be afraid to blot off some of your paint. I want to pull some of this off. There we go. Just to soften it a little bit there. Let me zoom in. I really like the way this is drying here. I don't know if the camera's going to pick it up. Let's see. I really like the color combos happening right up here. And then I like the color combos happening right here in that part of the window. That's actually, that's actually a pretty pretty cool close-up there. Uh, Jody says, "You are so brilliant." Oh, thank you, but not really. Not really, I'm not brilliant. I appreciate that. I just, uh, just having some fun. I, if I, there, I, yeah, I'm not brilliant. Um, I'm learning, you know. I know CAD pretty well. And I know 3D printing, so I'm trying to combine the both, you know, especially since I do teach CAD and we have 3D printers in our class. You know, I want to make sure I'm doing stuff as well and I'm keeping up with the software. I do have some ideas of things I'd like to print and make over the summer. More to come on that. It has to do with art printing. Stuff. Alright, I can't resist before heading out tonight to throw down some of my trademark neon pink. Pshew, there it is. It's looking cool. Where am I going to put the pink on this? Let's see. So the paper I'm using tonight is Fabriano 1264 cold press. This is actually an 8-inch by 8-inch square, square sheet of paper. Really like the square format, and I thought it'd be fun. I've been, I've been doing a lot of, uh, on this size here, so I've been doing a lot of them on this 4x8 size, which I also love. This is the Copper Building, New York City. So I thought it would be fun just to kind of switch it up and do an 8x8 piece tonight. I'm hoping to go into NYC this summer and try to sell some of these original sketches of some of the iconic places in New York City. That would be really fun. That looks cool. I love that pop of pink. Very cool. I think this one's good for now. When it dries, I will come back and add some more detail with my Sharpie or probably my Pilot pen. The man says as he doesn't know. Just add some more sketchy lines in here. I like that this is inspired by the Met building, but it's not trying to replicate it. It's just taking it as a— as some inspo. And it keeps me loose, it lets me do my colors on it. Yeah, this is cool. Just trying to pull out these doorways a little bit these openings. Alright guys, there you go. This is, uh, my take on the Met for today. Let's throw down I know I have yellow, but I want to throw down some neon yellow. So let me just grab my neon yellow colored pencil. Boom. And let's throw some neon. I just want to, I want to add a little more brightness or lemony zest. Yes, we're going into cooking terms. Let's add some lemony zest to our sketch with this neon yellow. It's really vibrant and fresh. Sometimes these sketches need that freshness just to pop it up a little bit, brighten it up. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I like that. Very much so. Usually I'll wait till the paint's dry before I put colored pencil on top of it. Kinda cool. Alright guys, I'm gonna— if you have any other questions or comments before I head out, Um, this has been awesome, so I'm going to add this to my NYC series. Let me, uh, I'll show you guys some of the things I have so far if you're interested. Let me go grab them, they're right behind me, and we'll just lay, we'll spread some things out here on the table and wrap up. Just cover this. I will show you guys a 3D printer printing but I don't really have— I can't really take this camera off here. Some other time I'll just do a 3D printing demo if you're interested. I'll show you guys how I do a little bit of that world. Alright, so we have this, this. I don't know what else we got. Uh, this is the Biltmore, so this is not NYC. I'm loving these Biltmore sketches. It's a whole different series. Here's another New York City scene, Domino Park. This is Seattle. This is New York City. This is the Atlas statue by Rockefeller Center. This I have to mail tomorrow, so this was sold actually. I sold this beautiful iris. Which came out really cool. So this is getting mailed out tomorrow. Put that here so I don't forget. Here's another New York City. This is the Louis Vuitton building. This was just fun, playful colors. So that's the Louis Vuitton building. Here's a quick sketch of the Guggenheim Museum. So I like this size, I like the 4x8 sheets. Here's the spire of the Empire State Building. Ah, here's actually a sketch I did of the Met while I was there. So this is an urban sketch of the Met building when I was sitting there looking at the front. Actually, let's put these next to each other. So you can kind of see, this is the actual Met. This is my inspo from the Met. What would happen if they actually met each other? That was a good joke, you get it? All right, let's move on. Here's a kind of a— from Central Park looking at some of the silhouettes of the buildings, real quick sketch. Of course, one of my most favorite buildings there, St. Patrick's Cathedral. My most favorite statue ever, Miss Liberty. This is the Biltmore. Anyway, so those are just some of the sketches I have of NYC that I will be bringing with me to the city. And they're nice and easy to carry. I think I'm gonna leave this one black and white. I kinda like it. There you go. So that was a quick show and tell. Hope you guys didn't mind that. And I am gonna wrap. Um, Luis says, "Now I want lemony zest ice cream." That sounds interesting. When I think of lemony zest, I think of Italian ice. Like a nice lemon Italian ice. That sounds good. Mm-hmm. Oh yeah, one more. This is a Brooklyn Bridge, part of the Brooklyn Bridge. I like this one black and white too. I really like the line work on here. Guys, thank you so much for watching. I do appreciate you all so, so much. Um, thank you for following me on Facebook, that's huge. Thank you for liking and subscribing on YouTube if you haven't done so. I'd love for you guys to do that. I'm trying to get to 4— I got so close, I was trying to get to 400 subscribers by the end of May. Got so close, 391, just 9 away. So let's— hoping I can make 400 this month. That would be awesome, be so much fun. Alright guys, thank you so much. Have an amazing, amazing Monday. Keep putting positivity out there with your creativity, or just a simple blessing, someone, a smile, a wave hello. Sometimes it's just simple things in life that can make the biggest impact. I appreciate y'all so much. Peace and live creatively. I'll see you guys. I'll be on— I'll try to be on this week at night. I know it's gonna be crazy the next 2 weeks with school wrapping up, but I'll try to pop on if I can. In the meantime, I'll keep posting my stuff on Facebook. Thanks guys, take care, have a great, great night. Usually I wave with my left hand 'cause then I could find the off button with my right. Good night, guys. Take care.
