When I first saw this bird flitting among bright pink-flowering bushes high on a balcony in Tijuana, Mexico, it was a lifer for me. Its actions seemed to indicate it was a flycatcher. What was it?
Later I found it in a bird guide—a Black Phoebe. Its range is the southwestern USA, Mexico, and parts of South America. This phoebe favors areas near water, and it certainly had that in Tijuana with the ever-swelling waves of the mighty Pacific.
I didn’t identify the flowering bushes, so I gave this one a rose of Sharon for his perch.
You will need:
- Regular paper
- Card stock
- Foam sheet
- Black fine-tip marker
- Pencil
- Acrylic paints
- #20 fat brush
- Fine brush
- Soft-lead pencil colors
Colors used (either paint or pencil colors):
Dark green, pink, black, gray, lime green, rose or dark red, purple, cream, white
- On regular paper, lightly draw 1” grid lines and sketch your bird scene block by block as the guide picture shows. When you like what you see, trace over your drawing with a fine-tip black marker. Place that under your card stock and trace the phoebe with your pencil. Trace the flowers with a pink pencil color, and the leaves with dark green.
- Your scene is ready for color! Do the eye first, using a black fine-tip marker, leaving a highlight. Use that marker for the beak as well. Trace over the feather markings with a stylus tool. Now begin shading with a black pencil color, and watch the feather divisions pop out. Now here is where I switched to black paint. The undercoat of black pencil color is very useful, and the feather divisions help you to see where to tuck in black paint and where to highlight the feather divisions with gray paint. Add slight highlights of gray to his head. The white lower belly area needs some gray for shadow areas.
- With pencil color again, begin shading the flowers with pink, and burnish with white. You can do this entirely with pencil color or switch to pale pink paint. (I used Pink Parfait with some white.) Do slight petal divisions and bits of the border with a darker pink or with rose. The center rays were done with a blend of dark red and purple paint. Place dots of cream paint for the center stamens.
- Do leaves in blends of dark green, a bit of black, and lime green, with white/lime green highlights.
- Finish up your scene with a blush of pale blue chalking done with a fat #20 splayed brush. (As I have often cautioned before, do that first swabbing on scrap paper to avoid ugly streaking!) Sign your piece and enjoy your work of art!
