I recently did a pencil drawing of a candy store, with a shop keeper, customers, and a few mischief makers releasing birds into the store. I started to wonder how they got those birds and came up with this idea. Here is the summary (character design and location reference not included).
I wanted it to be more about the bird trap, so I kept higher contrast there. Knowing what areas I wanted to keep light, I started with the shadows and washed in a glaze of blue and pink. Next, I added green and yellow, followed by ultramarine/grey to the birds.
For this illustration I used limited colors, using only Sennelier's Deep Ultramarine, Bright red, Lemon Yellow, and Payne's grey watercolors, on Arches hot press watercolor paper.
It was probably at this point I realized that I missed printmaking. (Add that to the list of things I can be doing during COVID19)
Initially I wanted this to be a big scene, with a lot happening, bikers going by, dog walkers, people hanging out windows, but then decided to narrow the focus. I'll use those other characters in another scene.
The first rough sketch:
