Bird by Bird

 All I have for this post is bird art.  Yes, we also had our two regular sketch zoom meetings, during which we drew stuff that wasn't birds, but I didn't like either of the pieces, so I'm not sharing them.  So all you get is seven birds.

Monday's bird was fine, but then I hit a bit of a lull with a couple of perfunctory performances where I wasn't feeling the love for art (or for painting Yet Another Bird), but then things steadily improved with a strong outing on Friday followed by my best work of the week on Saturday.  Sunday wasn't too shabby, either.  

So, here is the Monday bird, a Pied-billed Grebe with a chick crawling up, heading for shelter.   The nest gave me some trouble, but overall I was pleased.

Then came Tuesday and this Juvenile Sandhill Crane.  It felt as if I were just going through the motions, as if I'd hit a slump in my enthusiasm for the "bird a day for a month" challenge.  It's okay, but just that and nothing more.  No flair, no life, nothing that makes it special.  

The same can be said for Wednesday's bird, this Steller's Jay, which is certainly competent, but just not exciting.  

On Thursday, I had a stern talking to myself, and felt determined to Do Better.  I chose a challenging photo reference (one of my own) of a Violet-green Swallow swooping in to feed a fledgling.  While there are still some minor issues with it, I did enjoy drawing it more than the previous two, and felt as if I were getting back in stride.

And indeed, I was definitely back to the high standard I hold for myself on Friday, when I did this Swallow-tailed Gull.  Part of my earlier issues stemmed from using the wrong paper for the medium, which added to my frustrations, but this day the supplies I'd ordered arrived and I was able to work on good quality watercolor paper once more.

Then on Saturday I had a lovely time not only drawing a bird, but drawing three birds AND coming up with my very own composition.  This is not my forte at all -- I like to find something to draw and just draw what I see, but this time I had an idea about doing falcon eyes, and it just sort of all came together.

I drew a Prairie Falcon on the left, a Peregrine Falcon in the middle, and a Gyrfalcon on the right, varying their poses and coloring.  Then I tossed in the Eye of Horus for extra fun (Egyptian sky god, typically depicted as a falcon).  I like how it turned out.

Yesterday it was back to the standard "find a picture and draw it" method.  I chose a Puffin, and used the good watercolor paper again, and I'm quite sure it made a difference.  Much less frustration all round.

And now there are only seven more days to go in this bird-a-day project -- whew!