Study in Balsam Poplar Bark (publ. 2024-07-18)

Balsam Poplar, a.k.a. cottonwood, has an interesting bark that becomes deeply furrowed as the tree grows. I did a sketch of a section of the bark on a tree near the Tanana River. I completed the bulk of the sketch during my lunchbreak last Tuesday (July 16) and went back on the 17th to finish up shading and detail work. I used cross-hatch shading, with some extra lines to try to give an impression of the texture on the outer face of the bark.

Balsam Poplar bark

I took this photo of the original though unfortunately it is a rather fuzzy and dim photo:

Balsam Poplar photo

My sketch is very loose with placement and shapes and such, mainly trying to just borrow interesting curves and layout.

Something that strikes me, in my studies of God's creation, is how many varieties we get of each basic functional or aesthetic idea. All leaves serve basically the same function for plants, but there are many different shapes, sizes, edge patterns, vein patterns, and so forth, between different kinds of trees. Likewise, tree bark provides basically the same function for all the different trees, but comes in many different colors, textures, and thickness. The earth would be a much less interesting place if we only got one kind of leaf, one kind of bark, and so on.

Copyright

CC BY-SA 4.0 Deed