I am a beginner in ink and wash. I use a permanent ink liner for sketching and then use Cotman watercolours for colouring. My question is: for my purpose, is 300 gsm 100% cotton hot press or cold press paper better? Or is it okay to use lower GSM paper as well?
Last year, in the Western Ghats mountains of southern India, we waited beneath a tree where a Spot-bellied Eagle-Owl was known to appear before beginning his nightly hunt.
And then he arrived.
Without a sound.
Without disturbing a leaf or even the air around him.
One moment the branch was empty. The next moment, he was there.
Large. Silent. Watchful.
The Spot-bellied Eagle-Owl does not enter a forest like an ordinary bird.
He appears like a ghost in the darkness.
Some towns stay in memory through monuments. Santorini stayed with me through bread, blue windows, and quiet staircases climbing toward the sea. This sketch is not an architectural drawing of the island. It is a recollection of walking through its white lanes, noticing church doors, uneven steps, and the smell of warm bread drifting out from small bakeries in the afternoon light. The lines are simple because memory itself is simple. We rarely remember every detail. We remember fragments that stayed with us.
Santorini looked like a town in school uniform. White walls, blue domes, narrow lanes, all standing neatly under the Mediterranean sun. While sketching in Oia, I noticed the beauty was not symmetry but small imperfections. Tilted buildings, uneven steps, fading shadows, and bougainvillea spilling quietly across the cliffs
Kiunga is not an easy place for wildlife photography.
We start around 4:30 in the morning, crossing the Elevala River in a narrow country boat, moving upstream in darkness while avoiding floating logs with the help of a battery torch.
By 8 a.m. we reach the Flame Bowerbird hide deep inside the rainforest of Papua New Guinea.
Then suddenly it appears.
The Flame Bowerbird, perhaps the brightest coloured bird on earth, glowing on the dark forest floor like a small piece of fire.
Papua New Guinea. August 2023.
Key Monastery, Spiti Valley. Ink and wash sketch from memory after a late autumn journey through the Himalayas. I was not trying to paint every building exactly as it was. Only the feeling stayed with me. Cold mountains, silent walls, and a few warm windows glowing against the approaching winter night.
Trogons are very colourful birds, about 40 species in this family, seen in Asia, Africa, and Central and South America. They are very colourful and fun to sketch creatures. This one is a Malabar Trogon, endemic to the Western Ghats in South India.
At Sri Padmanabhaswamy Temple in Thiruvananthapuram, India, wealth is spoken of in billions, yet it rests quietly. I sat with this view longer than expected. Ink holds the structure. Wash suggests what cannot be held. I did not try to complete it. Some places resist being finished. They remain.
A simple sketch before the wash. Trogons belong to the family Trogonidae, with around 43 species found across Central and South America, Africa, and tropical Asia. They are usually quiet birds, often sitting still for long periods, but carry strong, contrasting colours that stand out in the forest.
A quick sketching study of the Malabar Trogon, a quiet bird of the Western Ghats.
Watch the form take shape before colour settles in.
The stillness of a red ember in the dense forest, the Malabar trogon rests quietly, watchful and composed, often missed even at close range — a fleeting wildlife encounter in India.
The Barking Owl in Papua New Guinea is a curious bird. It carries an almost innocent look, but its call is unsettling. In the dark, it can easily be mistaken for a dog barking somewhere in the distance. I photographed this bird at Varirata National Park during a 2023 trip