Raymond Sheppard - Drawing Birds

HOW TO DRAW BIRDS

INTRODUCTION

Quite recently I was asked by someone, why I liked drawing birds so much. Well, I had never really considered whyI just drew them, but when you really come to think of it, you know, there are a lot of amazing and interesting things about birds that most people dont realise.

Just think of all the varieties of plumage, in what lovely patterns this is arranged, on some birds so indescribably delicate. But did you know that all this pattern, so lovely in itself, is there to serve the bird a very useful purpose? It is really a sort of camouflage, about which we have heard such a lot recently, a protective coloration which merges itself into the birds natural background of rushes, grass or stones, and as long as the bird is motionless it is invisible to its enemies. I expect our camouflage experts have learnt a lot from the study of these protective patterns and colours of birds. This colour, too, is never quite the same. I was watching some lapwings the other day by a lakeside, and sometimes their dark backs appeared quite grey, and then perhaps the light would catch one, and it seemed to glisten like shot silk with purples and greens.

Those big aeroplanes which fly overhead look rather like great birds, dont they? You see, the men who design them have been studying the shape and flow of lines of a bird, which they call its streamline, and they have tried to adapt these shapes to the designs because they know that birds are the most perfectly streamlined creatures in the world. But I am afraid man has got a long way to go before he produces a flying machine as efficient as some of the birds. Look at the sea-gull, how easily he floats on effortless wings. Throw a piece of bread in the air and he swoops with the precision of a Spitfire. Of course man will never be able to invent a covering for his aeroplanes which is as efficient as the birdsI mean feathers. Nothing else we know of combines such lightness and flexibility with such strength. It is these wonderful things,featherswhich make it possible for such a heavy bird as the swan to fly many thousands of miles on migrating. You would never dream this possible to see him waddling along the ground like something out of a Silly Symphony.

Arent there a lot of exciting things to know about birds? You know, the more you watch and observe them as they go about their ordinaryI should say extraordinarylives, the more amazing and wonderful things you will find out about them. I dont know of any other living creatures who are so much the masters of every element. Why, some ducks, besides being very strong flyers, not only swim on the water but under it as well and dive and walk! Of course to be able to do this they have developed perfectly and beautifully shaped bodies. It must take a very quick little brain to control the energy required for such rapid and varied action. This bright bird-brain looks at you from every avian eye. No wonder that all through the ages mankind has been absorbed and fascinated by the study of bird-life.

On the temple walls of ancient Egypt you may see carvings and low reliefs of the birds men venerated and worshipped for three thousand years. Ages ago in China, artists had captured for ever on silk, graceful attitude and delicate pattern.