Painting a puffin

Thursday's seem to come around every seven days with complete regularity, and I think to myself what on earth shall I blog about this week....I ponder on different subjects until my mind settles on one. 

It does feel like we are all slowly unfurling out of our long winter isolation like the ferns  that are appearing in my hedgerows. Life is also getting busier, we can meet again, and even enjoy a drink in a pub garden 

I have spoken before about the joy I find in the countryside, we have enjoyed walks further a field than our little village recently 

Spotting native bluebells along the way .

So whatever you have been up to this week , I hope you have found some joy in it, this little puffin is something else that might bring you joy, it is a lovely little painting to have a go at for an hour or two. 

First I sketch out the puffin floating on the sea, then add a bit of masking fluid to represent the reflection, although later I do kind of paint over that bit but I do it now in case I think I might need it.

Then I paint the eye, Mainly grey ( cobalt blue and burnt umber) with a dark iris and a dot of white , the surrounded by a ring of orange, this is where your tiny brushes come in handy.

Then i add some shadows and texture to the face with cerulean blue and a purple colour made from cobalt blue and cadmium red, all done wet in wet.

Now to add the details on the beak , lovely Indian yellow and a touch of red to make orange

Look carefully and add the details

Then the black parts the highlights in cerulean blue and purple and the black parts with paynes grey. Let the colours merge, 

I used the same colours on the black at the top of his head

 

Now we are getting looser, more texture on the body and blues abd purples in the black parts the paynes grey, Have fun and see the patterns on the bird emerge.

Finally a hint at the waves with a lot of water and some indigo and cobalt blue

I waited for it all to dry and rubbed off the masking fluid, but I felt the reflections looked too harsh so I painted over them and added some white acrylic splashes

Have a lovely week this week and maybe paint a puffin x