Fishermen’s Cottages, Newhaven – Pencil

An attempt to try a new (to me) technique when using pencil. If you look at the window bars (mullions) and the light coppiced stems from the base of the tree they stand out from the dark background. Ernest Watson in his book

Course in Pencil Sketching

advises that these thin areas can be created by pressing a “Blunt point like a toothpick” (I used a ball point pen which has no ink left in it) into the surface then using a pencil to shade over the area. The white lines are left. It really works.

Newhaven is a small area of Edinburgh near the Firth of Forth. It was, originally, a village in its own right but gradually was swallowed by the port of Leith which, in turn, was encompassed by the city itself. This building looks run down but my scene was copied from an old photograph. The buildings have since been extensively renovated and are much sought after. Strangely this tree still stands and still looks the same.