Sophie leaning back on a chair

My granddaughter Sophie, aged 9, can't stay still for long, so I got here to pose on this chair and took a few photos, and then made this sketch from the best one.

It is done in charcoal, with the pad supported by an easel so that I could work vertically. Some initial studies got the legs a bit too short, and the tilt of the head and the angle of the left arm took a few tried before I got them fairly right.

I tried to fill in quite a lot of detail, but felt I might actually ruin the image if I tinkered any more. So this slightly unfinished picture was the result, and was the main piece for my final assignment.

Liz does Facebook

In the final stages of my drawing course, I did this charcoal sketch of my daughter Elizabeth in a typical pose - crouched over her phone textng and updating her Facebook status.

I took some photos of her in the pose (as she would not have stayed still), and then used a stick of charcoal taped to a long brush to do the main part of the drawing. This was recommended by my tutor as a way of freeing up my rather cramped style. I finished off the detail with charcoal held in the hand, as the long stick was a little hard to control.

The whole thing took no more than 10 minutes, and I'm quite pleased with the immediacy of the pose and the sense of frantic concentration...(and yes, she does have long prehensile toes).