I used my colour swatches to help me mix the right colours. I felt nervous when I started it and got more confident the more I did.

My Final Picture

Lessons learned from the picture

• The grid technique made it easier to draw accurately
• It was really useful to be able to decide on the different different colours before I used them
• It was also useful to experiment with different textures
• It’s important to plan which spaces are meant to be white. I accidentally painted over some spaces which were meant to be white so I have to fill it in white with white acrylic paint.
• Contrast is really important too because it makes the subject stand out more
• I got one of the wing patterns wrong because I focused so much on painting so I forgot to look 🙁

Overall, I thought the picture went pretty well and was worth the while.

I printed the photogragh a an A3 size. Then I used a grid technique to copy the picture. I drew lines across the picture so it was divided into 9 squares, then I drew the same grid on my paper. I covered tall of the picture except one square and I drew that square in the same square on my paper. Then I covered the next square on my paper. So I copied the photograph one square at a time.

Drawing the bottom centre square of the phototgraph

I tried to mix the right colours to match (or come close to) the colours in the real picture. I found different ways of creating the greens and browns in the picture, I also tried ti find ways to create the different textures of the picures. I used the handle of a brush or the blade of a knife to scrape reeds in the paint and white acryllic paint for the flecks of white on the wings.

I decided a while ago that I wanted to paint a bird of prey so I chose to paint a red kite. First I drew some sketches to decide the composition of the picture. I looked at zooming in on one part of the kite and zooming out on the whole kite.

Aububon shot the birds he drew and then stuff them and put wire inside them. He then posed them and painted the bird in front of him. I won’t do this of course, I will draw it from a photograph. I looked online for photographs of red kites in different compsitions and I chose one of a red kite catching a fish not far from where I live.

My final picture is going to be a watercolour and for school I had to make a picture of a shipwreck. So I tried different ways to paint the sea and sky with watercolours. Sometimes I painted different colours on each other when they were wet so they blended together and sometimes I waited for the first colour to dry before I painted the next colour on. So I mixed green with blue and black to create the sea and yellow, black and dark blues for the storm clouds.

And also I tried scraping the paper with a knife to create foam. I wanted the sea to look rough so I tried swishing the paint around a bit to create an agitated feel. I quite liked the effects I got although I think it looks better from a distance. Here are some of the practices.

Today I looked through some books and online at the history of watercolour paintings. One of the first people to paint in watercolours was Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528).

Today I went down to a pond and drew some geese.

As a part of my Arts Award I have to write an article about an artist so I chose John James Audubon. He is famous for his book called Birds Of America. Read my article. Here is a picture by him:

Today I looked at different types of lines and how they make a picture feel. Horizontal and vertical lines feel more static and stable but diagonal and swirly lines give the picture more energy. You can combine the different types of lines to make a more interesting picture. It is also more interesting if the subject isn’t in the middle.