11 January 2013, Permanent marker, 11" x 13.75"
This was probably the most colorful Green Sunfish I had ever caught. They're typically pretty colorful fish, but I had never seen one with such intense red-orange fin margins. I suspect this was a male displaying breeding coloration. The fins were also proportionally larger than those of any other Green Sunfish I can recall. The fins in the drawing aren't quite as big proportionally as they were on the actual fish... I guess I subconsciously shrunk them down a bit when I sketched it out. I chose to illustrate this one in a style similar to the Longear Sunfish posted previously. The fish stands alone pretty well, so I decided it didn't need any sort of background. Here's my photograph of the fish originally posted on The Naturalist's Angle:
I decided to take a couple of photos of the process this time... since that seems to be something that art bloggers do. I'm still fairly new to being an art blogger, so you'll have to forgive me for not posting any photos of works in progress previously.
This is where I sat down to work on the drawing during my lunch break. It's nice to be able to work on art in the rain under a pavilion overlooking the lake at Oak Mountain State Park.
I had sketched in pencil at home the night before, so my goal for lunch was to define the outline with ink.
This is where I sat down to work on the drawing during my lunch break. It's nice to be able to work on art in the rain under a pavilion overlooking the lake at Oak Mountain State Park.
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| An ideal environment to work on nature inspired art |
I had sketched in pencil at home the night before, so my goal for lunch was to define the outline with ink.
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| Basic sketch |
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| Outlined in ink, pencil erased, Go Grizzlies! |
It's a pretty big leap from that basic outline to the finished product, but I got so carried away with stippling that I forgot to take any more photos along the way. Maybe next time.
Jay
ReplyDeleteAmazing work that takes a great deal of patience----Excellent color variation in the sketch to match the image. Have you fished Oak Mountain? Thanks for sharing
Bill, Thanks for the compliment. Oak Mountain gets a lot of fishing pressure and the fish seem pretty well educated- at least the big bass. On Lunker Lake, they feed on schools of shad in open water like Stripers and I've yet to catch one... too hard to follow in the kayak. The Bluegill are mostly small and overpopulated. There are actually signs at Lunker Lake that inform anglers that catch & release practices may be hurting the quality of the fishing, and they encourage you to keep your catch... if it's legal of course. I'll let you know if I ever catch a decent fish there. I know they're there, Kelly and I have seen them.
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