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Some more Aussie birds plus one import (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter Trevor Hawkins
- Start date
Laura G. Young
Well-known member
Love the swamphen! Reminds me of the New Zealand pukeko. ;-) You really captured its expression well. Your straight-hatched lines in the drawings are bold and unique, and your overall handling of watermedia is nice, indeed.
Best wishes,
Laura
Best wishes,
Laura
Trevor Hawkins
Well-known member
Thankyou Laura, Re the swamphen, if they aren't one and the same bird they are certainly related, in Australia the nickname (by anglers) for the swamphen is the 'bush chook'. Bush being a slang word we use for the Australian countryside, and 'chook' being slang for a hen or rooster.
I tend to work a lot in pencil, it's probably my favourite medium, it's so immediate. You may have noticed on the crow (not on the cormorant) that i have some white lines on different angles from the pencil strokes. They are eraser marks, i often also use the eraser as a drawing tool to smudge and blur to add effect.
I tend to work a lot in pencil, it's probably my favourite medium, it's so immediate. You may have noticed on the crow (not on the cormorant) that i have some white lines on different angles from the pencil strokes. They are eraser marks, i often also use the eraser as a drawing tool to smudge and blur to add effect.
Laura G. Young
Well-known member
Eraser marks? Ah, yes! I see that now. Very cool effect. What sort of eraser do you use? I just discovered the Japanese Mono Zero for fine linear effects.
P.S. "Bush chook" sounds much more Aussie (and therefore way cooler) than "swamp hen". I like it.
Hope to see even more of your work,
Laura
P.S. "Bush chook" sounds much more Aussie (and therefore way cooler) than "swamp hen". I like it.
Hope to see even more of your work,
Laura
Trevor Hawkins
Well-known member
I usually draw on the same paper i paint on which is heavy 640gm hot press so it can take a fair amount of handling and scrubbing if need be. So i normally just use any quite hard eraser such as a Staedtler that i can trim back with a scalpel blade to give me fine edges if i need them throughout the work.
I'll see if i can hunt a few other sketches i've done that show more of that erasing effect.
Thankyou for the interest in my work Laura, and yes i agree 'bush chook' definitely sounds more Aussie. Here's a couple more, we call rabbit 'underground mutton' because in the depression days that's the only meat families had to eat to replace lamb meat, crocodiles 'floating logs' because in the wild northern rivers they will just float on the surface and drift with the current like logs. I'll check out those erasers you've mentioned.
Trevor.
I'll see if i can hunt a few other sketches i've done that show more of that erasing effect.
Thankyou for the interest in my work Laura, and yes i agree 'bush chook' definitely sounds more Aussie. Here's a couple more, we call rabbit 'underground mutton' because in the depression days that's the only meat families had to eat to replace lamb meat, crocodiles 'floating logs' because in the wild northern rivers they will just float on the surface and drift with the current like logs. I'll check out those erasers you've mentioned.
Trevor.
Trevor Hawkins
Well-known member
Here's a few more pencil sketches Laura that may show the eraser marks i often use. It depends on how i'm feeling or the sketch itself as to how much i use it. I've found it can be overdone and then it looks a bit 'tricky' rather than part of the overall drawing process.
Attachments
Trevor Hawkins
Well-known member
They are a very beautiful bird John, not wild here at all unfortunately, only really available to see in wildlife parks.
Laura G. Young
Well-known member
Wonderful drawings, all of them! Thanks so much for sharing.
--L
--L
Trevor Hawkins
Well-known member
Yes, a Brown treecreeper Rodrigo. With my art and my writing i spend a lot of time in the bush (Australian countryside) sketching and taking photographs. The more detailed works are mostly off photographs, the loose sketches like the treecreeper are from life.
resparza
Well-known member
I used to live in north QLD many years ago, and did a lot of field work in the bush (Kimberley and Northern Territory). Your paintings and sketches make me a bit nostalgic about those days. I wish I had been more confident to sketch birds in the wild back then... maybe I will be whenever I go back there
Thanks again for sharing!
Thanks again for sharing!
