Inktober: Oct 15 – Black-Necked Stilt

101516-inktober-black-neck-stilt-birdNow here’s a bird that lends itself to drawing with an ink brush! Black-Necked Stilts have ridiculously long legs. They’re long when the bird is in water; on land, it looks like they have legs that were meant for different bird. Most of the time, they’re in enough water to look proportionate (for a wader, anyway.)  

This bird is mostly ink, with a little PO73+PB29 combined for a shadow color. (I mixed this on the palette for a change, for a muted violet.) The legs are PO73 again, in a thin wash that keeps it more salmon pink than orange. The background started as PY151 with PY129. I hated this, and added some PB29 Ultramarine over the PY129. It was a good decision – I don’t love the background, but don’t hate it anymore. It’s actually reminiscent of Green Apatite, minus the red granulation.

Painted from a Wikipedia reference. This is about 6.5″ x 7″, Strathmore Windpower 140lb CP, drawn with the Kuretake #40 ink brush. Again the ink brush was a joy to use. It covered the large wing areas with ease and effortlessly delivered the fine swirls that indicated the shadow areas on the white breast and belly. I tend to work larger when using this tool as well. That feels rather freeing after years of working almost exclusively in a 6″ x 9″ sketchbook. Learning so much through this challenge!

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