On reflection....

On reflection....

Spring seems to have left us ,as the rain falls on my studio roof, April showers are now order of the day and the temperature has most definitely dropped. I keep nice and cosy and sit enjoying new views from the large windows in my studio.

I like to allow myself to paint whatever I fancy towards the end of the week and sea birds have been attracting my attention . Today I wanted to keep things simple and concentrate on the birds and their reflections, letting  the white paper do the work for me. It has been a lovely day painting osytercatchers 

I have mt equipment ready, my trusty watercolour paints , etc and a nice cup of tea

 

 

Then I draw the image onto bockingford watercolour paper, 

 

 

No masking fluid needed , just watercolour paint and water.

I start with the eyes, I use a very small brush as these eyes are tiny and I still want them to shine

 

 

Look carefully and I leave a small white dot to reflect the light starting with my lightest colour and going darker

 

 

I went around the eyes first then moved to the beak to let the eyes dry . The beaks need to stand out too. I do just love the colours on these birds, they seem to have such cheeky characters

 

 

So I move between the eyes and the beaks making sure I leave highlights of white paper or very light yellow to show how shiny things are

Then onto the bodies

 

 

I start by adding the shadow to the underneath of the birds, to make them feel 'real' and give them that 3 dimensional-ness

Then onto the black feathers, and here I use cerulean blue and purple lake as well to give the feathers shine and highlights. I use Paynes Grey for the black 

 

 

Finally I work on the reflections,  you are almost painting 4 birds ( not 2) I wanted the reflections to speak for themselves and not add any paint for the water. I did turn my paper up side down and kept standing back to check it looked ok.

 

 

I didn't mention those fabulous legs but take care with those too.

This painting is quite precise and it hangs on the precision so take your time and have fun x

 

 

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1 comment

Very helpful Rachel. Ty, John

John Hughes

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