The Albert, Deal, with a limited palette

The aim of this exercise was to build on previous drawings and do a picture with a limited palette of colours. The scene is of the Albert pub in Deal, Kent, which sits at the corner of a square, with a large white building in the far distance

Since I've not used Conte pastels very much so far, I decided to give it a go, as I just have some very basic colours -- black, white, grey and three browns.

The first attempt was on watercolour paper, mainly because my tutor has been encouraging me to use heavier paper with more 'bite". However, I discovered quite quikly that Conte and rough paper don't work very well together.

Working from a photograph, I nevertheless persisted with the picture. I'm not really pleased with the result, not only because of the roguh surface, but because I seem to have got the perspective all wrong with the sightline set too high.

 So I gave it another go, still using Conte crayons, but with smooth cartridge paper - and a lower sight line.

I think the perspective works better this time, but I found Conte crayons very messy to work with and I was constantly trying to clean it up. I found the limited palette very restrictive: there was a lovely red telephone box in the far distance in the square which I had to leave out. I did cheat and put in the double yellow lines, which are a prominent feature of the naroow lane.