The Cornell Lab Bird Academy › Discussion Groups › How to Paint Birds with Jane Kim › Draw: Northern Cardinal Basic Shapes
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Bird AcademyBird AcademyShare your work! This forum is a space for you and others taking the course to share, comment, and exchange helpful ideas.You must be enrolled in the course to reply to this topic.
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I"m at the beginning of the course, lesson 2. When I signed up for the class, I thought it was watercolor based. I am a watercolorist and not sure I want to spend the money to purchase all the acrylic paints that are required. Should I drop out -- or can I just use watercolor paints instead once we start painting. And if so, do you have any special watercolor colors that you specifically want us to use. Thank you
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Hello Donna, I will send you an email to with some various alternatives to you. We try to make it clear in the course description that this is fluid acrylic paint in this course but that doesn't mean everyone sees the materials references before hitting the buy button. So it can happen. There are some other students on here using alternative types of media. You probably won't be able to get the same colors and fine strokes and texture if you use watercolors. However there is plenty to learn in the course such as drawing, feather tracts, bird anatomy considerations, and other tips and tricks that are useful. I will send you the promised email later tonight or this weekend. In the meantime you can search through the various posts throughout this course discussion boards and see the outcome others using watercolor have had. Here is the advice from our course developers: We don't recommend substituting other media for this course. To maximize your success in taking this course and for optimal results in your artwork, we strongly recommend investing in the Golden Fluid Acrylics, in the colors listed. Once you've mastered Jane's techniques in fluid acrylics for this course, you could find ways to adapt them to the range of capabilities of your preferred medium, if not acrylics. NOTE: Price for all paints from Amazon as of December 5, 2022: $76. Price for all paints from D. Blick as of December 5, 2022: $69
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I carve birds, mostly waterfowl, but songbirds as well. I have never been happy with my painting ability. Hopefully what I learn in this course will be helpful in my carvings as well. Does anyone know if the water brushes will work on wood?
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Hahaha, I made the cardinal look so angry! I couldn't help but to draw some curved lines, especially under the rump. He's threatening to give me the cold shoulder if I don't get his portrait just right.
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That’s really funny, I like it.
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I use an erasable blue pencil to sketch because I've always had a habit of drawing heavy-handed. Also crinkled my paper going over with a kneaded eraser, but at least it's just the initial sketch.
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Something my husband (who has been drawing their whole life) helped me see was a little notch at the center top of the beak that really helped show that the bird's head is at an angle!
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You can see my paper crinkly from all the erasing!
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Here are the house sparrow’s feather groups (I couldn’t find a discussion like this in the page about feather groups):
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Here’s my first sketch 😊
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This was so fun to draw! :)
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Wow, great job!
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I had fun with it too! Nice job :)
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I found this exercise and Jane's approach overall, very helpful. For someone with a lot more experience, drawing shapes might be too basic. But as a complete novice, it taught me how to focus on the subject matter and has built my confidence that I might actually be able to do this!
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My Northern Cardinal
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Fun!
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