Watercoloring an Eastern Bluebird

 This week the water coloring throw down is playing along with this Eastern Bluebird video seen here on YouTube. I own so many bird stamps I knew I would enjoy the learning curve of trying to paint one, I did not sketch any of mine ahead of time though. 

I had decided to do a couple of connecting circles in a mix of pale buff titanium and added the red breast and blue back/ head colors of that while it was still wet for a wet on wet blending. I liked the colors I had chosen and stuck with them for the whole flock of birds I ended up painting. there is a smidge of payne's grey in the buff Titanium and that is what the legs were also. So I let this dry.

and the one from photo number one is the one propped up on the light next to the grumpy blue bird coffee mug. which is where the colors for my birds inspiration came from. ( it saved me from walking back and forth a million times to the video to see what she had used) (honestly I like my colors better) 

the hardest part of this for me is deciding how far over the wing should come on the belly. I decided the first one was too skinny and I really did not like those flowers on the branch.

So, I kept adding more glaze of paint on the birds every time they dried trying for some depth to the painting. the top one here, I did not like the leaves after I added them to the budding branch and the head/neck area was off too. So the bottom bird seen here is what ultimately was finished into the card below. I also switched off from the size 8 round to a size 2 round in both a Neptune and an Escoda Perla.

These were done off an on over most the afternoon and evening on Saturday, and at one point I did drag out some Carolyn Shores Wright Stamps Happen Bluebird stamps because, I knew the colors were wrong around the eyes, neck cheeks and wanted to see how someone else had colored them. ( and I am a total fan girl of her art) so, those can be see off to the side at the top of this view. 

Other changes I think I would make if I were to do this again would be to make that a solid tapered tail rather than this split thing here.  I recently played with some Tim Holtz die cuts and one of the birds in that set had a dove tail split looking like what I painted here. It's funny how everything comes out as far as inspiration/influence goes. I do like this version with just the buds of blooms on the branches, and how the feet/legs turned out. I wish the white I had added around the eye had not faded so much but, such is life. 

To finish this off I added the sentiment from the Essentials by Ellen set called back yard bird friends and put the painted panel up on foam tape over the SU Succulent card base. This one finished out at 5 1/2" square in real life. You can find this challenge here at Splitcoaststampers to play along with us. Thanks for stopping by.