The Most Important Thing in Wildlife Art...

Osprey in Tree. Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

is getting a sense of the life and movement of the subject. A bold statement I suppose and one that many would argue with. But for me I'll quickly say that if I can't see the whole bird, animal, insect or whatever in a piece of wildlife art I'll quickly surmise that the artist is working from a photo which does not in fact show the entire subject and he's loathe to try to imagine what he can't see. It's easier to just crop everything out and hope that the flat, abstract design will be appealing enough to counter the fact that the artist has not shown how the weight of the subject is distributed, where the body is moving, where the eye is glancing, etc. It almost never is enough to counter that huge loss.

I say this mainly because I'm very familiar with it. It is the problem that stopped me cold when I first started wildlife, specifically bird, art. I was completely unsuccessful working from life, mainly because birds wouldn't sit still. And my own photos, the only ones that it seemed right to work from, almost always left part of the bird hidden. Even today it's a great treat to be able occasionally to be able to see the whole bird. I think that is one of the appeals of shorebirds. Often you can see the entire bird. As a bonus it often sits still.

In any case this lack of knowledge of the entire bird still stops me from choosing to work from over 50% of the photos I've taken. The only mitigating factor is that I now have about 7-8 years experience sketching from life and I've learned enough about birds to make a good guess as to how the bird fits together, even when I can't see everything. But the most thrilling photos I take are the ones that show the complete bird in an intriguing posture. Those pictures are irresistible and I want to try to capture some sense of the movement in them.

So when winter comes and I spend much less time outside, especially sketching outside, I often will concentrate on doing sketches from my photos which show the full subject, mainly birds, but often insects and other subjects. All of the brush sketches on this page were done in the last week or so. And in almost all instance I did them because I could see the entire subject.

For me this will always be far more exciting, whether in my work or in some one else's, than the most elaborate reconstruction of feathers. It is the life of the subjects I see that I want to understand and portray, even when I work abstractly, and I just cringe when instead I stumble upon well delineated feathers and feather tracts. The latter may be beautiful but rarely does it have any sense of life.

American Copper, American Lady and Common Buckeye. Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

Osprey in Flight. Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

Purple Finch Eating Crabapples. Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

Red Knot. Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

Red Knot and Semi-palmated Sandpiper. Brush Pen and Watercolor Sketch by Ken Januski.

Zabulon Skipper. Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

Bits and Bobs, Sketching and Short Video

Almost as soon as I published my last post on including an environment in bird and wildlife art I noticed another method of bringing vitality and a sense of the excitement of nature that I'd forgotten to mention. This is surprising since it is what really convinced me that you could make art out of natural and specifically wildlife subjects. That other method of course is working from life.

I first noticed this in Drawing Birds by John Busby. But as soon as I posted the  last post I noticed another fine example by a contemporary Spanish artist. I think that there is something that so often comes through in the work of anyone who draws or paints birds or other wildlife from life. That sense of stagnation and boredom that so often accompanies work based solely on photos is completely absent in artists who work from life.

As you can see from the sketch above though not everyone is equally able when working from life. Except for the Common Green Darner at upper left the other birds on these pages were sketched by me over the last couple of days in Cape May, NJ. One of the more exciting birds was a Whimbrel at the Wetlands Institute on bottom left, two Seaside Sparrows only one of which I sketched on bottom right and the first visible Common Yellowthroat above. I'd heard them the day before but finally  a number came out to sing in their striking black, yellow and white colors. Though I didn't succeed very well I wanted to capture the fabulous yellow throat of the Common Yellowthroat.

In any case there are really quite a number of artists who work from life, though I know of very few American artists who do, though there are some. But they are well worth pursuing. And they do often create really strong art that has all the excitement of being outside in nature.

Black Skimmers at Heislerville WMA. Photo by Ken Januski.

I always enter my bird sightings in ebird and today I had problems with some birds seen on our trip. Ebird, with good reason, doesn't expect certain birds to be around yet, based on years of previous data. But birds always surprise you. One species that created problems was the Black Skimmer, two examples of which are seen above, from yesterday at Heislerville WMA in Cumberland County, NJ.
Normally I just upload my photos to Picasaweb and create a link that I can embed in my ebird list. Not today. All of my photos are currently missing on Picasaweb. My guess is that this is due to Google trying to force people to use Google+, their answer to Facebook. I understand their point of view but it's also a slap in the face to their users. So I won't soon be using Google+. In the meantime though I have no way of showing the photos to ebird. That is the main reason I'm showing the photo above.

Semi-palmated Sandpipers at Heislerville WMA. Photo by Ken Januski.

Less well seen and photographed at the same location yesterday were some Semi-palmated Sandpipers. Two are pictured above, also as proof for ebird.

Before we left Philadelphia for Cape May I had heard my first Louisiana Waterthrush, singing and singing but never making himself visible. Though I love to finally know that they are here it's always an exciting day when we see our first one. Today at Morris Arboretum Jerene had the honors of finding the first one. More than that he was very cooperative and seemed oblivious to us. So along with photos I also took a quick video with my camera and put it on YouTube: Louisiana Waterthrush at Morris Arboretum. I always greatly enjoy seeing them. And I think you can see from this video why it is difficult to sketch them, at least when they are moving as quickly as this.

From Warblers to Shorebirds

Spotted and Semipalmated Sandpipers. Field Sketch by Ken Januski.

Least and Solitary Sandpipers. Field Sketches by Ken Januski.

It's been years since I've seen a variety of shorebirds at Morris Arboretum in spring. It was almost starting to seem like something I'd dreamed. And yet yesterday an email stated that there was a LOT of mud flats there, and shorebirds.

So we were there for their 10 a.m. opening hoping the shorebirds, and shore, were still around. They were. How exciting it was to be able to see local Least Sandpipers again. I know that they can be found in a few other parts of Philadelphia in spring but Morris is very close by. It's far easier to hop over there. I love being able to see shorebirds there.

Above are some field sketches I did today. I'm rusty as is probably obvious. But I'm happy with them. I also took a number of photos and will most likely use both as the source of new work. In seeing shorebirds for the first time in a long time I tend to try to stay true to them rather than work more abstractly. Eventually I'll take greater liberties. But for now I'm hoping that they'll stick around so that I can concentrate on getting down their form.

Canada Warbler. Watercolor Sketch by Ken Januski.

Warblers are of course another story. I've never seen as many in Philadelphia as I saw at Carpenters Woods during the first 7-10 days of May. But things have quieted down - so soon!?!- and the foliage has filled in. What warblers remain are hard to see. Still I'm sure that there will be more to be seen, or heard, for another week or so.

In the drawing below I tried to quickly capture a briefly seen Canada Warbler. It's in upper right and quite disappointing. But I have wanted to commemorate some of the warblers seen over the last couple of weeks, first in watercolor and later perhaps in woodcut or linocut prints. Above is a quick watercolor sketch of a Canada Warbler, based on some photos of them from numerous visits to Shenandoah National Park in May.

Ruby-throated Hummingbird Buzzing Tufted Titmouse. Field Sketch by Ken Januski.

One of the more interesting experiences I've had while birding recently is in the upper left. Though it may be hard to read because I have the scale wrong it is a Ruby-throated Hummingbird dive bombing a Tufted Titmouse. It did this over and over for 60-90 seconds. At lower right another surprise. I didn't recognize the large bird when if flew over Carpenters Woods last Saturday. I knew it wasn't a heron, egret or cormorant. Then I ran into a local birder who'd just seen two Common Loons fly over. Sure enough  that's what it was. Also pictured  the ubiquitous Black-throated Blue and Common Yellowthroat Warblers.

It's hard to believe that spring migration is almost over. But it has been great. And I hope that I will eventually have a lot of artwork based on it to show and write about.