I thought that I would try a little bit of a different effect with this painting and go for a soft edge on the bird bath. As I’m always up for trying something new, to some extent.

Next I moved on to painting the feathers of the honey eater, which was an unusual order as I usually paint the eyes first.

On this occasion I wanted to make sure that the black face was painted first so I could judge the lightness of the blue surrounding the eyes.

I started off with a light blue and gradually painted it darker until it matched my photo.

I always like painting birds feet but struggle with a nice sharp claw, I’m slowing improving.

I started painting straight after breakfast and forgot I was supposed to have a faded edge to the bird bath. Looking at my photo I realised that I needed to darken the water up and then I darkened the bird bath to the edge of the masking tape, so an end to my soft edge.

This was looking a little stark so I added a soft cream background and that seemed to balance the painting up a little.

This has a slightly different frame as I thought it would look better in a black mount representing a window. This is how I saw the bird from inside the house while working on another painting.

I’m very easily distracted by birds when they come in a wide variety of striking colours as they do in Australia.

This painting will be added to my market collection as I’m thinking of painting a larger honey eater for my exhibition next September 2022.