How I layout sketchbook pages – bird sketching edition

Although I love sketching birds I’ve not drawn any for quite a while – time to change that again. Here’s a look at how I designed a page of bird sketches, featuring a black redstart.

We have a lovely black redstart (or several?) in the neighborhood. It’s a small flycatcher (Eurasian variety) that’s slightly smaller than a sparrow, with a handsome black face and throat, and a dashing red tail. These birds can be identified from a distance because they make a slight bobbing motion every few seconds, and they sing beautifully, usually from a roof or lamp post.

For my redstart sketches I was in need of references – yes, it’s always great if you can use your own photos or even sketch from life, but not everyone has the time and luck to be able to create their own bird photos first, or can observe birds for that long. I’m lucky enough to get good photos of big park birds, but those smaller ones are usually shy. I have the approach that when I saw the bird in real life and have identified it, I’m allowed to use references.

A word about references and stock images:
I’ll write a separate post about how to use references and stock images for sketching because there have been so many changes to the due to the presence of AI-generated images everywhere. In a nutshell: check and double check, and use references from respected sources. Also make sure you’re allowed to use the images for personal use. Using your own photos is always the best solution.

I find drawing birds very relaxing because you mostly deal with simple round shapes, one for the head, and one for the body, and then you have a bunch of straight lines sticking out (beak and legs and tail). For bird study pages, I usually don’t think up a fixed layout before I start drawing, I just begin in one corner and then place the sketches as I go along. But you could definitely select your references and draw a small layout thumbnail if you really want to design a study page.

I usually start at the top with the first sketch and then do 2-4 complete or partial sketches on one page. What interests me most about birds is of course getting a good look at the entire bird, the plumage, stance and several poses that seem characteristic. This is something you will be better at when you can actually observe the bird for a bit, because photos can distort the stance and how it moves.

I typically finish my pencil sketches first, maybe focus in one interesting poses or draw parts repeatedly like the head, and then switch to color.

I always try to distribute the color evenly on my pages, so that the layout is nice to look at and color can lead you through the page or spread.

You do not have to fill every last centimeter of your page with color, let unfinished sketches stand as they are, as studies and explorations – that’s the beauty of the sketchbook. Don’t expect from yourself to create flawless finished results on every page. As a lot of things in life, making art and observing nature is a process, something that you do continuously, not something that’s defined through one end result only. It’s fine to show this.

The black redstart sports an elegant combination of gray, black and rust red, it’s fun to paint. When adding details to bird drawings, don’t think about individual feathers, think about the plumage. One add details in a few places. As with all sketches, they will look more fresh when you apply brush or pencil strokes in one go.

I started two of the sketches with an angled pencil – using the flat side for a more shapes-oriented sketch, similar to the very loose big shape sketches I’ve done recently. But it’s not as fun on a smaller scale.

Gaps can be filled with text – here Wikipedia or a bird guidebook will come in handy, or your own observations. I like to mix these two, a bit of citizen science (I saw this bird on that day/time and it did the following..) and some facts that I will memorize better when I copy them down.

In this case, I also included a quick sketch of the common redstart (very similar but has a red breast), and a sketch that isn’t representative of the bird’s color at all but is just a value sketch (lower right). I added a few frames around some areas of the page. I usually don’t do this and I actually don’t enjoy it that much on this page – lesson learned. But it can be a useful way to structure your layout.

You’ll also see that I taped over one corner of my sketchbook page – this is to hide a failed sketch. Yes, these happen to me too.

I hope this was a helpful insight in how I plan and create these pages. Let me know if there’s anything specific you’d like to know in the comments, or feel free to suggest a new idea on the idea board!