Drawing Birds (Dover Art Instruction) - Softcover

Sheppard, Raymond

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0486820327 ISBN 13: 9780486820323

Verlag: Dover Publications Inc., 2018

Inhaltsangabe

Throughout history, people have been obsessed with bird imagery, from carvings on the temple walls of ancient Egypt to modern-day murals, posters, and even tattoos. This helpful instructional volume by a renowned artist and teacher offers a wealth of well-illustrated advice on depicting all manner of birds. British illustrator Raymond Sheppard was celebrated for his nature and animal studies, and this book combines two of his most valuable guides, How to Draw Birds (1940) and More Birds to Draw (1956).
Suitable for beginners as well as advanced artists, this single-volume edition of Sheppard's two great guides provides in-depth studies of the shapes and visual construction of a variety of birds, from domestic fowl to birds on the wing. Topics include anatomy; the representation of wings, feathers, and flight; and details for drawing beaks, feet, and plumage. Common birds such as thrushes, redwings, blackbirds, and starlings appear here, along with many other species, in addition to ducks in and out of the water and birds of prey such as the barn owl, buzzard, and golden eagle. Written with clarity and infectious enthusiasm, Drawing Birds offers an abundance of pointers that will benefit amateur and professional artists alike.

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British illustrator Raymond Sheppard (1913–1958) was celebrated for his drawings of nature and animals for books and magazines. He published three art instructional books with Studio Publications and is perhaps best remembered for a 1952 edition of The Old Man and the Sea, which he co-illustrated with Charles Tunnicliffe.

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Drawing Birds

By Raymond Sheppard

Dover Publications, Inc.

Copyright © 2018 Dover Publications, Inc.
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-0-486-82032-3

Contents

How to Draw Birds, 
Introduction, 
A Method of Approach, 
A Talk about Anatomy and Construction, 
Wings, Feathers and Flight, 
Beaks, 
Feet, 
Ducks, 
Ducks in the Water, 
Well-known Birds seen from the Breakfast Table, 
Starlings, 
Birds of Wood and Hedgerow, 
Oyster-Catcher and Curlew, 
Heron, 
Kingfisher, 
Partridge, 
Domestic Fowl, 
Raven, 
Three Birds of Prey — Barn Owl, Buzzard and Golden Eagle, 
Common Buzzard, 
On the Wing — Gull, Duck, Swallow and Kestrel, 
Kestrel, 
More Birds to Draw, 
Introduction, 
Laughing Jackass, 
Simple Shapes and Structure, 
Making a Start, 
Finches, 
Blue Tits and Great Tits, 
Queen Alexandra's Parakeets, 
Flightless Birds, 
The Cassowary, 
The Dodo, 
Penguins, 
Drawing with a Brush, 
Pheasants, 
Kalij Pheasant, 
Turkey, 
Guinea Fowl, 
Some Nests, 
Greenfinch and Weaver Birds, 
Baby Birds, 
Domestic Ducklings and Chickens, 
The Study of Detail, 
Doves and Pigeons, 
Great Bird of Paradise, 
Australian Lyre Bird, 
How Birds Fly, 
Drawing at a Rookery, 
Magpies, 
Jays, 
Kestrels and Condors, 
Owls, 
Background Studies, 
Java Sparrows, 
Blackbird, 
Nightingale, 
Great Spotted Woodpecker, 
Pictures from Your Studies, 

CHAPTER 1

HOW TO DRAW BIRDS

INTRODUCTION

Quite recently I was asked by someone, why I liked drawing birds so much. Well, I had never really considered why — I just drew them, but when you really come to think of it, you know, there are a lot of amazing and interesting things about birds that most people don't realise.

Just think of all the varieties of plumage, in what lovely patterns this is arranged, on some birds so indescribably delicate. But did you know that all this pattern, so lovely in itself, is there to serve the bird a very useful purpose? It is really a sort of camouflage, about which we have heard such a lot recently, a "protective coloration" which merges itself into the bird's natural background of rushes, grass or stones, and as long as the bird is motionless it is invisible to its enemies. I expect our camouflage experts have learnt a lot from the study of these protective patterns and colours of birds. This colour, too, is never quite the same. I was watching some lapwings the other day by a lakeside, and sometimes their dark backs appeared quite grey, and then perhaps the light would catch one, and it seemed to glisten like shot silk with purples and greens.

Those big aeroplanes which fly overhead look rather like great birds, don't they? You see, the men who design them have been studying the shape and flow of lines of a bird, which they call its streamline, and they have tried to adapt these shapes to the designs because they know that birds are the most perfectly streamlined creatures in the world. But I am afraid man has got a long way to go before he produces a flying machine as efficient as some of the birds. Look at the sea-gull, how easily he floats on effortless wings. Throw a piece of bread in the air and he swoops with the precision of a Spitfire. Of course man will never be able to invent a covering for his aeroplanes which is as efficient as the birds — I mean feathers. Nothing else we know of combines such lightness and flexibility with such strength. It is these wonderful things, — feathers — which make it possible for such a heavy bird as the swan to fly many thousands of miles on migrating. You would never dream this possible to see him waddling along the ground like something out of a Silly Symphony.

Aren't there a lot of exciting things to know about birds? You know, the more you watch and observe them as they go about their ordinary — I should say extraordinary — lives, the more amazing and wonderful things you will find out about them. I don't know of any other living creatures who are so much the masters of every element. Why, some ducks, besides being very strong flyers, not only swim on the water but under it as well and dive and walk! Of course to be able to do this they have developed perfectly and beautifully shaped bodies. It must take a very quick little brain to control the energy required for such rapid and varied action. This bright bird-brain looks at you from every avian eye. No wonder that all through the ages mankind has been absorbed and fascinated by the study of bird-life.

On the temple walls of ancient Egypt you may see carvings and low reliefs of the birds men venerated and worshipped for three thousand years. Ages ago in China, artists had captured for ever on silk, graceful attitude and delicate pattern. Monuments to the eternal appeal of birds are these lovely relics, caught in still attitude upon the ageless stone and silk.

I think that the real reason I like so much drawing birds is not entirely because I am so interested in their lives and actions, but more so because of the innumerable patterns I can make out of their so varied and graceful movements, the limitless groupings, arrangements and placings of curves and lines and shapes that arise from their ever-varying postures. It is so exciting trying to get just the right lines, to suggest an attitude or rhythm momentarily observed, be it fluent line of swan or heron, or rugged squareness of the eagle. Art and beauty are so inseparably woven together, and birds are undoubtedly the most perfectly formed of living creatures.

Wouldn't you like to be able to draw them yourself? There is nothing to stop you, because the whole secret of drawing is learning to "see properly," and we all have two eyes, so that once you have learnt to observe and use your eyes properly you too can get started on this fascinating study of drawing from the living bird. The trouble with most beginners is that they see too much. By too much I mean they become absorbed in details of plumage and delicate pattern before they have learnt to see those big simple shapes upon the surface of which these accessories are placed. Consequently they produce a flat feathered map of a bird.

I have devoted a part of this little book to explaining the basic form and construction of a bird, the few simple masses in which the feathers are arranged. And once you have got interested in these things and learnt what few important facts to look for, it will surprise you what fun you will get out of drawing from living, moving birds.

A METHOD OF APPROACH

Most people I have talked to about drawing birds have said that "it must be very difficult because birds move so quickly and never keep still." These people, of course, are thinking about the way they have been taught to draw such subjects as still-life groups or a posed model, where they are told to close one eye, hold a pencil at arm's length, and measure up relative proportions that they are unable to judge with their own unaided eyes. This method is bad in any sort of drawing (it makes you see things as 'flat' not round objects, and leads to an expressionless sort of copying) and in our sort of drawing i.e., moving, living birds, it is of course a quite impossible method. Well, you say, just how am I to tackle the subject?

You will remember in the introduction I said that drawing is really learning to "see properly." "But," I hear you...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Dover Publications Inc.
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2018
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0486820327
• ISBN 13: 9780486820323
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 112
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Soc. Agr. La Raia Ss; http://www.la-raia.it; ; Strada Monterotondo, 79; Novi Ligure; 15067; Italien