Nuagier played an important part in French winemaking history. Also known as les aficionados de la pluie, the Nuagier’s task was simple: to taste the rain. An experienced Nuagier could then advise the vintner on how best grow his crop for best taste and yield.

Today’s theme was tourist. I immediately thought of a backpacker – so I used this photo from a stock image site a rough reference for the sketch above. This was done with a #2 pencial and cretasoft 4601 charcoal.

This is a stretch for Lake – it is really an ocean, but I am just running with the idea though thematically incorrect. Recently, Zealandia was confirmed as sunken continent. While Aussies may have you believe they are just a chain of islands off their coast, the truth is more complex. New Zealand actually lies smack dab in the middle of a 94% sunken continent known as Zealandia. Here’s a quote from the above explaining the new thinking about what Zealandia actually is:

“The idea that continents extend out to continental shelves – that they don’t just stop at the shoreline – is something quite new to non-geologists. Once you accept that and you look at a world map, it is quite obvious there is a relatively high standing area of sea floor all around New Zealand. There is a coherence and a tangible reality to it – rather than being remote islands in a modern-day context or in a Gondwana reconstruction context, Zealandia is something you can draw a line around. It is a definite part of the Gondwana jigsaw puzzle.”

The proposed Maori name of Zealandia is Te Riu-a-Māui. This translates to “hills, valleys and plains of Māui”. So to honour the legend of Maui, I sketched Maui tossing his fishnet over a small part of Te Riu-a-Māui/Zealandia.

This sketch was made with pencils and coloured pencils.

This was a goulasch soup of mediums starting with pen (phase 1), pen, ink, pencil (phase 3), and finally pen, ink, pencil, charcoal. The phase 2 looks the best to me, therefore I’ll list it first! The idea was adding a bit more to the usual electrical transformer by transforming birds in scavengers.

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Here is the original analogue sketch done in pen. This was then digitised in photoshop.