by RickC » Tue Apr 07, 2015 2:46 pm
Anytime, everyone who gets into this has screwed up more birds than they like to count. My strength in this is the carving portion, I'm more mechanically minded than artistic. Color theories are like frickn Greek to me so I muddle through and learn a little each time, mainly through mistakes. A couple hints I'll give you while I'm thinking of them. Grey.......it's usually assumed that to get grey white and black is mixed, unless you want a bluish tint mix white and a little raw umber until you get the shade your looking for in the color. I'm guessing your painting with acrylics. Two things with that, for practice birds or boards whatever low end acrylics will work but for a service bird I recommend Traditions, JoSonja, Liquitex and there are a couple others that are very good paints for working birds. The other is thinning acrylics. Normally water is used and is fine just don't use too much as it will hinder the paint in binding to the surface. I dip my brush and dip it into the paint on my pallette and that has worked well. There are what's called mediums that can be used to thin, blend, glaze and more.
Have any question shoot me an pm or email anytime. If you facebook I have two decoys groups Waterfowl & Gamebird Counterfeiters and Collectors, and a workshop group as well.