Greg Butler
Well-known member
Tim, Mike thanks for the advice, I'm going to go away and work on it for a while taking onboard both your remaks and ideas. Will post it again when I'm done.
Greg
Greg
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New to painting birds! (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter Greg Butler
- Start date
Greg Butler
Well-known member
timwootton
Well-known member
Hi Greg - definitely the way to go.
With huge apologies if this is out of place, but I very quickly scooted your beautiful portrait across to PS and scrubbed in a quick 2-tone 'underpainting' of the bird. All this shows is how much the focus reverts back to the main area of interest (the bird's face) if the viewer is allowed to get to that point without the distraction of a too-sharply demarcated line. You could, should you so wish, easily drop a similar colour/tone onto your painting and perhaps overlay the suggestion of a few more (subtle) breast feathers receeding into the dark, so to speak, and get a much more rounded and pleasing effect.
What do you think, Greg?
With huge apologies if this is out of place, but I very quickly scooted your beautiful portrait across to PS and scrubbed in a quick 2-tone 'underpainting' of the bird. All this shows is how much the focus reverts back to the main area of interest (the bird's face) if the viewer is allowed to get to that point without the distraction of a too-sharply demarcated line. You could, should you so wish, easily drop a similar colour/tone onto your painting and perhaps overlay the suggestion of a few more (subtle) breast feathers receeding into the dark, so to speak, and get a much more rounded and pleasing effect.
What do you think, Greg?
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Greg Butler
Well-known member
Yes I do see what you mean Tim. I was intending to put more feathering into the dark areas but I think your idea of continuing the bird to the bottom of the painting works better! No it was not out of place I'm here to learn!
Thanks, I will post it again when I'm getting closer to finishing it!
Greg
Thanks, I will post it again when I'm getting closer to finishing it!
Greg
Greg Butler
Well-known member
Well I've roughed out where I think most of the feather should go. Not a very good photograh but I don't have very good light to take it by. Still I think you can see where it's starting to go. Just need to spend a good bit of time on the feathering and the shadowing. Thanks for the help it has pushed me on to do a lot more to this picture than I would have done on my own. Will post again when it's getting somewhere near finished!
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timwootton
Well-known member
Great stuff, Greg - but I think it could easily be called finished now. Up to you, of course. Superb portrait.
Greg Butler
Well-known member
timwootton
Well-known member
Superb!
Greg Butler
Well-known member
Well I spent a few days looking at it and just had to do a little more. I realised that the golden hackles were just a little too far round the neck on the light side so have moved them back a little and I think it makes the head look more balanced. Let me know if I'm wrong!
Greg
Greg
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timwootton
Well-known member
It's fabulous Greg - now leave it alone! 
Greg Butler
Well-known member
It's fabulous Greg - now leave it alone!
Thanks Tim, I think I needed someone to tell me to stop!
cjoakley
Well-known member
Hi Greg,
Haven't been on the board for eons ( and no - not busy painting - busy working - grr!)
You could have stopped after you added the additional light - but the finished painting is absolutely brilliant stuff...
As Tim says - leave it alone now. What's to to improve on anything this good?
Fabulous job!!
Haven't been on the board for eons ( and no - not busy painting - busy working - grr!)
You could have stopped after you added the additional light - but the finished painting is absolutely brilliant stuff...
As Tim says - leave it alone now. What's to to improve on anything this good?
Fabulous job!!
kittykat23uk
Well-known member
Wow! Thats a stunning piece!
Greg Butler
Well-known member
Thanks Nick!
I hope this is not going to be a duel post as I have tried once and it didn't seem to work!
As I said in my first post I only started painting last year. I was bored one day and just happened to find an old water colour box, had a go and was hooked! Lots of things I don't know, I don't really know how you guys go about starting you paintings after your sketches. I don't know if I paint like the rest of you as everything I do is self taught and I have never had any training. After all the help and advice I was given with the last one I thought I would start at an earlier stage and see just how many brains I could pick. I started this one last night and have been sitting working on it this evening. I have included pictures at three stages but as you can see there is still one hell of a lot of work to do on this one.
Thoughts, advice, suggestions etc really welcome!
Greg
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Greg Butler
Well-known member
timwootton
Well-known member
Mmmmmm - tasty.
I would have commented earlier, but really I think you are finding your own way with this one. The turn from light to dark on the forewing is a special piece of work and I think the pose is beautifully captured. I suspect the success of the painting will hinge on the rendering of the rocks and just how you place the background. As for the bird - it's another cracker.
And - I wouldn't get too hung up on your lack of formal training. I had an 'artschool education' - learning lifedrawing, print, 3-d etc and went on to Uni to study illustration - BUT - what I was actually TAUGHT there I could write on the back of a postage stamp. I, like most of the rest of us I suspect, consider myself to be self-taught (mainly cos my tutors hadn't a clue about any genre outside of their own comfy specialisms (and one was Tony Ross - the children's book illustrator. Google him and you'll see what I mean!!!) In fact, I spent 2 weeks in Scotland just to try and get close to birds to draw them, fairly unsuccessfully as it turned out. My tutors' advice on my return was to stop buggering about trying to draw birds from life and learn how to take good photographs of them - I could then copy those!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Needless to say I didn't see eye to eye with them.
I would have commented earlier, but really I think you are finding your own way with this one. The turn from light to dark on the forewing is a special piece of work and I think the pose is beautifully captured. I suspect the success of the painting will hinge on the rendering of the rocks and just how you place the background. As for the bird - it's another cracker.
And - I wouldn't get too hung up on your lack of formal training. I had an 'artschool education' - learning lifedrawing, print, 3-d etc and went on to Uni to study illustration - BUT - what I was actually TAUGHT there I could write on the back of a postage stamp. I, like most of the rest of us I suspect, consider myself to be self-taught (mainly cos my tutors hadn't a clue about any genre outside of their own comfy specialisms (and one was Tony Ross - the children's book illustrator. Google him and you'll see what I mean!!!) In fact, I spent 2 weeks in Scotland just to try and get close to birds to draw them, fairly unsuccessfully as it turned out. My tutors' advice on my return was to stop buggering about trying to draw birds from life and learn how to take good photographs of them - I could then copy those!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Needless to say I didn't see eye to eye with them.
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