Capturing Motion & Specialized Movement
Video Reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Sj-UdjqlFw
Image Reference: Walter Weber Illustrations. (2017, July 18). Retrieved August 02, 2017, from http://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/photos/weber-illustrations/
In this piece, I plan to show how the Magnificent rifle bird, one of the many birds of paradise, dances to attract a mate. Among the Magnificent rifle birds, the male stands out and has blue iridescent feathers on its neck to appear attractive to other females. With this piece, not only do I hope to show how the bird moves but also how the neck shines and glows.
My preferred breakdown sketches are either the "fly away" ones or the "dance" ones because both show movement very well, especially the "fly away" breakdowns. I find the "dance" breakdowns quite amusing to look at and it's the primary pose for my piece, so how could I not enjoy it? It also gave me wing anatomy practice before I continued onto my larger version.
My goal for this project is to expand my acrylic abilities and the capacity to experiment with different types of blending. Acrylic painting has always had an unpredictable outcome whenever I utilized it, leaving me timid when considering to using it again. However, I am not opposed to trial and error. I aim to use acrylics mainly but I'm not against mixing other mediums, which will happen inevitably with this piece since I intend to use micron pens to accentuate the thinness on the abdomen's feathers and white gelly roll pens to make smaller highlights visible.
Acrylics have their ups and downs, for me especially, but it additionally depends on what type of acrylics are used. For this project, I'm using matte paints with some iridescent paints as well to help show the way the neck shimmers. Likewise, acrylics assist in making the feathers look smoother rather than chalky if I were to use prismacolor pencils or pastels. Besides, I don't have any need for a wide range of colors for this piece because the bird consists of the colors black and various blues, disregarding the landscape that may or may not be around it.
Image Reference: Walter Weber Illustrations. (2017, July 18). Retrieved August 02, 2017, from http://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/photos/weber-illustrations/
My preferred breakdown sketches are either the "fly away" ones or the "dance" ones because both show movement very well, especially the "fly away" breakdowns. I find the "dance" breakdowns quite amusing to look at and it's the primary pose for my piece, so how could I not enjoy it? It also gave me wing anatomy practice before I continued onto my larger version.
My goal for this project is to expand my acrylic abilities and the capacity to experiment with different types of blending. Acrylic painting has always had an unpredictable outcome whenever I utilized it, leaving me timid when considering to using it again. However, I am not opposed to trial and error. I aim to use acrylics mainly but I'm not against mixing other mediums, which will happen inevitably with this piece since I intend to use micron pens to accentuate the thinness on the abdomen's feathers and white gelly roll pens to make smaller highlights visible.
Acrylics have their ups and downs, for me especially, but it additionally depends on what type of acrylics are used. For this project, I'm using matte paints with some iridescent paints as well to help show the way the neck shimmers. Likewise, acrylics assist in making the feathers look smoother rather than chalky if I were to use prismacolor pencils or pastels. Besides, I don't have any need for a wide range of colors for this piece because the bird consists of the colors black and various blues, disregarding the landscape that may or may not be around it.
While working on this piece, I struggled to cooperate with it as I expected. Acrylics are not my strong suit but I was determined to make it work as best as I could. Changes I had to make include the shading on the feathers and the tree colors. It was quite difficult fixing the tree, again and again, hoping that maybe I would have an epiphany moment when I discovered how to texture it better. Unfortunately, this did not go as I would've liked and the colors came out incorrect. The highlights in the feather looked okay but I'm afraid I went a little over board and now it lacks shadowing.
Disappointments I have with this piece is the sloppiness of the tree and the leaves below and around the bird. Something that has always bothered me about acrylic painting is how the edges don't come out smooth and angular as I would like it. My belief is that I'm not skilled enough at acrylic painting to know how to make the edges smoother yet, and I'm content with that. I just need to practice more heavily with acrylics.
If I had the chance to redo this, and I'm sure I will in the future, I would like to make an alternate version with a minimalistic landscape rather than trying to make it more complex. The feathers on the wings would be smoother and darker, more realistic. The leaves would have more texture and form, rather than a sloppy paint job. Also, the wings should be more symmetrical and 3-dimensional to show the depth in its feathers. It's slightly discouraging to see the difference between progress images four and five because four looks amazing but when I made changes it caused it to look more slack in image five.
My final thoughts on this project are that it could've been better and more detailed. The truth of the matter is that I'm good at making the focal point look detailed, not the background, which is something I plan to work on. It's frustrating when I try to draw a landscape and have it come out uneven and scrawled when I had an elaborate design planned out in my head. Of course, with practice, and plenty of patience, I can further my landscape abilities, making it easier and less stressful. I hope when I remake this piece it will have remarkable improvements and that it will convey the progress I've made.
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