Work In Progress: Osprey: Lover’s Key, Florida Update 10

            Last week I got a good start on the Osprey in flight. Much of the right wing and the head were completed (or nearly so, since I usually complete 90% of an area and then go on to another, so that I can determine later if more work is necessary, based on the completeness of surrounding areas). I then started work on the body. Since the light is coming from the right side of the painting, I started shading the right side of the bird (the side away from the light. Here I used a combination of french greys, 10% and 30%, as well as FC warm grey I and cloud blue, layering them slowly until I felt I was close to what I wanted. I also used FC white to help blend them and make the transition to the whitest white (the color of the paper).

            The legs then came next. Using the same colors I worked in the shadows and developed the form. The area just above the feet is nearly devoid of feathers, so the rough skin texture becomes more visible. The same is true of the toes. There are a lot of creases and wrinkles. Here I used a very sharp HB lead in a mechanical pencil to work in more detail. The talons were drawn in with FC dark sepia and reinforced with HB lead.

            Since I was working on the feet I decided to do a little work on the fish – just enough to give the feel of it in the bird’s grasp.

            After both legs and feet were complete I went to work on the tail. The tail is in part shade and part bright light. The shaded part on the bird’s right side only caught light here and there but as feathers transitioned to the bird’s left, they caught more light. So more grey was added on the bird’s right and more of the paper showed through on the bird’s left. I left shadows as well as highlights on the feather shafts. Here and there where the light affected the feathers I added raw umber.

            All that’s left now is the bird’s left wing, outstretched, all of the underside visible. The first order of work here was to work out the pattern of darks in the feathers. Once I have that laid out, I’ll go back and finish it, filling in the details.