Requiem II

[tealin]

Yesterday's Sketchbook - Fooling around with Carrot (WooOOOooo! Okay, not in that sense.)

Today's Sketchbook - The second annual Dead Bird Drawings. Yesterday, a crow died in our yard. It had been hanging around looking pretty sick when I left for work in the morning, and when I came home it was sitting on the railing by the front door and didn't move when I walked right up to it, so I knew it wasn't long for this world. On one hand, it's sad because I like crows, but on the other, it's happy because I like crows but they can never hold still long enough for me to study them. Having one die in my yard is, in some perverse scientific disconnected-from-reality way, an incredible gift. I took about fifty pictures (which I can post online if anyone's interested) and drew a page of beak studies before it got too dark. I'll get out there early tomorrow morning and hopefully get a few more pages in before the CDC comes to pick it up and test for West Nile.

There's something so incredibly beautiful about the design of a bird... the way the different feather groupings interplay, the streamlined shape, the fan of the wings, the versatile and prehistoric-looking beak ... my childhood enthusiasm for ornithology has just been translated into an artistic fascination, combined with some sort of emotional attachment that I can't really explain but which is incredibly moving.

Comments

Materials

[lumosart.livejournal.com]

How do you manage to get your scans so clear? What type sketchbook are you using. Is that a real dead bird? x/

Re: Materials

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

My scanner is a Canon Canoscan D646U ex. I put my sketchbook on it and hit 'scan.' I scan in colour and then greyscale it in Photoshop because it turns out better that way than if I scan it in greyscale, don't ask me why. Those scans haven't even been adusted for brightness/contrast or anything.

No, a bird whose species I really like died in our yard yesterday but I decided to draw off a stuffed plushie instead
Of course it's a real dead bird. What would be the point, otherwise? Wanna see photos? It's just a dead bird. The only difference between it and a live one is that it's dead. I used gloves, and it's about the temperature of a mild refrigerator outside so it hasn't decomposed much in the 24 hours since it died, and it doesn't stink at all. I didn't lick it or anything.

Re: Materials

[(Anonymous)]

"I didn't lick it or anything."

I would hope not.

[viqii.livejournal.com]

eww,,,i mean...i t's better drawing the dead bird itself than recreating a photograph, but I still think it's disgusting...

i love the way you drew the eyes...i have BIG problems drawing ppl's eyes...

[cerridwen666.livejournal.com]

I have a fascination with birds as well. Don't feel too bad. I'd like to see the pictures actually. I've never been able to get any good picture of birds up close or even find them and... *wishes a bird would die in his yard as awful and sad as that thought is*

[maladroitness.livejournal.com]

i agree. i think that birds are one of the most dainty, graceful creatures--and not just in their structure. i love their movements to. you know, that sort of twitchy quality to them that is still somehow elegent?

wonderful drawings. how cold is it there?

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

Er... I think the high today was about 9°C, but that was only for a couple hours in the afternoon, after the clouds left and before the sun set.

[maladroitness.livejournal.com]

whooo, that's cold. i definitely live in texas, and it was definitely like high eighties today x)
do you like the cold?

[wicked-warrior.livejournal.com]

Pity, there aren't crows here around, I've just seen them on documentals, though I really love them ( I've got a book about the raven family somewhere :P ) I agree, the bird structure is something fascinating, with so many variations depending on their function and habitat. Pityt the bird fauna is disappearing around here. I'm interested about the pictures, if it's not much trouble for you to post them, I'd like to do some sketches too :)

[azvolrien.livejournal.com]

I have a somewhat morbid fascination for dead things. That sounded wrong, I know, but some things are just incredibly interesting. Skeletons, for an example. If I find a skeleton, there's not much that will stop me taking the skull and boiling it to clean it up. Pig, sheep, deer, dog, badger - any of them.

A dead crow in my garden would be a somewhat disgusting godsend. I one found a dead fledgeling swift in my dad's garden. Actually, it was alive when I found it, but it died shortly after. I'm just fascinated by how everything fits together. When the swift died, I picked it up and unfolded one of its wings, just to admire how the feathers went together.

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

I'm glad to know I'm not alone! It's only the CDC (and the fear of possible repurcussions from my roommate) keeping me from burying this crow when I'm done with it then digging it up in a few months to get the bones, or at least the skull. Then I would really know how the beak worked, how far back in the head the jaw connected, how close the eye socket is, etc etc. That thing is one tricky shape.

I hope (beyond reason) that the CDC comes this weekend and not next week while I'm at work ... it'd be cool to talk to them, and maybe I could ask them if they have any skulls left over. :)

[azvolrien.livejournal.com]

CDC?

The bird (possibly even the animal) with the weirdest skull of all is the flamingo. Flamingo skulls are just freaky. Well, normal for a flamingo, but you know what I mean.

[ari-enchanted.livejournal.com]

People are complaining that you drew a dead bird, but it's better than my dad taking a picture of a goat that had been mutilated by a mountain lion.

Wouldn't mind seeing the pics.

Carrot's awesome.

[priscellie.livejournal.com]

Beautiful drawings of the bird, and Carrot is adorable! Very few Discworld fanartists seem to capture Carrot's youth in their images (coughPaulKidbycough). He just turned 16 in Guards! Guards!, so he's still pretty ikkle. Well done!

[anarchistbrew.livejournal.com]

That's actually a really good point. I had n't really thought about that. How much time passes between the books? I guess we don't really know. I wonder how old Angua is? :P

Also I love Tallis's Fantasia on Theme, was just listening to it.

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

Yeah, Carrot is one of the few Kidby designs I disagree with ... hence working up my own.

[kaflower.livejournal.com]

Birds are fascinating to look at. How did the pictures come out? :)

[sparrowofjack.livejournal.com]

Oh, I've gained quite the knowledge of animal anatomy from the dead ones we keep finding, mainly birds, but some rodents To list a few:

Cedar waxwing - randomly smashed into my brother's helmet as he was riding his bike. Scared the crap out of my brother.
Robin - smacked into our window.
Bluebird - cat caught it.
Woodpecker - cat again, I'm afraid.
Chickadee - window.
Hummingbird - cat. This impressed me, as it was caught by my big fat one.
Vole, mole, mouse, baby bunny - cats.

And... half a rat. Bottom half, I'm afraid.

[ardys-the-ghoul.livejournal.com]

Your cat sounds like it would get along splendidly with my cat. He was always leaving dead animal bits on the garage steps for us to find. Of course, usually there wasn't enough of the animal left to identify it (eurgh).

And the cat catching a hummingbird is quite impressive, if a bit sad--I like hummingbirds :'(.

[niteflite.livejournal.com]

Well, I could go on a whole thing about how when my crochety old cockateil died, I totally freaked out and couldn't even look at him... but I also could go on about how my dad just got a boa constrictor from one of his students, and I'm dying to see that snake.

Of course, I could always go on about all the skeletons and antlers and stuffed ducks my dad has in his classroom. Wow. It sure rocks having a science teacher in the family. Now I wish I could draw, but I can't. Not well, at least.

[thefordmustang.livejournal.com]

Someone has to comment on those lovely Carrot sketches, so I will! They are great! They really remind me somehow of a cross between the 1950s hero perfection depicted in the lovely "Iron Giant" movie and the DIscworld novels! Hope we get to see more Carrot and Angua sketches in the future (and maybe a few of Constable Visit who I wish got more coverage- he is such a nice goofball)

[disneyboy.livejournal.com]

Much has already been made of your crow studies, all of it well deserved - I really enjoyed your Carrot drawings, too - all of them were great in different ways - maybe my favorites were the very top and very bottom ones - they have a fun, kinda goofy quality!

[disneyboy.livejournal.com]

You'll never read this, being in such an old entry, but what's the CDC?

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

The Centre for Disease Control. They want you to report dead corvids so they can test them for West Nile Virus.