going BIRDING

This Fall birds became an unexpected obsession at home and the city offered ample opportunity to indulge in the practice of "Birding."

What I like about the three pieces below is how the different types of pen I used gave way naturally to different styles of sketching. The medium point pen used for the boys sketching at the Museum of Natural History (see below) was just starting to run low and it allowed for a nice broken line, and in just the right spots.

Drawing Birds at Museum of Natural History: ink sketch

A month's worth of sketching later and the pen is significantly more depleted but still fun to use. In the sketch below, I was able to let the pen linger on the page without the ink soaking through to the other side or the page beneath. Now that I look at the sketch, I should have applied darker lines on the Great Blue Heron (top right corner) to help it stand out from plants along the bank of the pond.

Watching the Heron: ink sketch

This last sketch was done with a fine point pen. The fine point lends itself to producing a scratchy rendering with more realism than the sketches done with the medium point pen.

Binoculars Birdwatching: ink sketch

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