Cockatiel

[Enug]

Cockatiels are parrots native to South Australia. Using watercolour and palette knife.

100163

[eighty+]

Hi. June. Yes I like it. Very good. water colour. L. Must. Try. As l kept. Well away. From it. As was confused :D:D

Ciao. PLOOS Watch out for the Roo,s

[Enug]

Thanks a lot Mr.Ploos. Keep safe. HOO! ROO!

[D Akey]

The bird's nice.

The background reminds me a bit of a piece of paper one would test their airbrush on. Because it's contrasty it's too eye catching for the neutral and tight range in the bird's colors.

I would recommend that if you're putting it anywhere on the canvas, that you should own it. It seems like with the background you're saying "Whatever. . . I can't wait to find an interesting animal to paint."

Poor little cockatiel.

[Enug]

I really did try on the background, really, I did.:D I scattered bokeh to resemble foliage and then blurred because I felt it was taking attention away from the bird. However, as always, I will take on board your advice and have a think about an an alternative background - or none. Thanking you for your interest DA.

Cockatiels are great little talkers as pets and this one is not sad at all - he agrees with you of course and would like a better background.

[baviya]

Excellent Post!! I gathered lots of information here. Do share more updates.

[D Akey]

. . . I scattered bokeh to resemble foliage and then blurred because I felt it was taking attention away from the bird. . .

Interesting point you were going for an effect that resembled a known thing (bokeh). I guess the caveat is that if you're starting from a known look, that when one deviates from it to where it's unrecognizable as that, the familiar assoication is broken and it has to stand on its own looking spiffy or not in the context of the painting.

Those kinds of visual tropes are added to get the resemblance to whatever people have seen. Don't get me wrong. You don't have to do what people expect to see, but if you are aiming for a photographic effect, then the rest of the picture should resemble a photo, including the bokeh (personal opinion only).

So if you want to have a blurry, out of focus background that implies trees or whatever, as you well know that it supports the subject, it's safer to do things that are less contrasty than the subject. Going from veridian green to white is a pretty extreme, attention grabbing jump that yanks the eye to itself, the little scene stealer.

You could perhaps take your cues from painted portraiture -- not because of the strokes of a tonal background, but how it lays back, yet gives interest on it's own, often times by varying color slightly while keeping the values less active than the subject.

In the case of the bird in the picture, look at how subtle it is and go from there. If your subject is more bold, you can go with a somewhat more bold background. But your eye has to be the ultimate judge.

One last thing, I wouldn't paint the subject without the background and then hope to pop in a satisfying background. Because they relate to one another, you probably want to establish a general tonal and color relationship right off the bat. It will help you know how to paint your subject. It's a thing we learn time and again when painting. Often times we would have a pretty good painting of someone sitting for a portrait in a studio, where values related well, color was right, etc, and when a dark stroke was introduced late in the painting it suddenly made everything way too light. So pay attention to relationships all along the way unless you have been down that same road many times and know how to get to the endpoint again and again.

Hope this helps.

[Enug]

A lot to ponder there.:cool::cool::cool: I've just started another, so something to bear in mind. Backgrounds have been something I've often struggled with which is why with watercolours I have been leaning towards a simple 'splash' of watercolour.:confused:

(This was my reply yesterday but it must have got lost along with Mr. Ploos paintings up there in the ether!)