John Lawrence
Active member
February first already! As much as I planned to work on my birds during the month of January other things kept getting in my way. But the Westlake show is only about six weeks out so for me at least it is time to get a move on.
My personal theme for this month is to finish up a lot of decoys that have been sitting around partially finished, some for a number of years. Frequently I'll get an idea and sketch it out then cut maybe the head and carve it. Then something more important will become my priority. Every once in a while I'll move something and find one of those heads and I'll remember that original concept and start to think I need to work on this more.
My first two birds that I'll show you this month are in that vein. First up is that 2x10 redhead that I posted the beginnings of in January. I started the head at the Pymatuning show in '10. I glued up the pieces of the body in late December of last year and had full intentions of having it done by now. After a couple of adjustments to the head size and neck the whole look has changed and I have an alert high headed drake. I've been spending a lot of time on a web page called Wetcanvas recently. It a comprehensive artist's web page and I've been studying the Landscapes and Plein Air sections in particular. I particularly like the looser styles of paint you can find there.What I think I'm going to do is go for a freer more simple look to the bird, at least at this point anyway. Here is that drake redhead made from basswood and 2x10s from the Home Depot.
View attachment P1310262.jpg.
View attachment P1310263.jpg.
Years ago a group of guys and I were entering what we called the "Buddy Rig" at Westlake. The idea was just to have six guys all make one decoy in our own style and put them in the six bird rig contest. The first year we did buffleheads and we didn't even get to float them because a couple of the guys didn't quite understand the rules that they use. When we were getting close to the show it looked like one fellow wasn't going to be able to finish his hen so I started a hen just in case. He ended up finishing his bird and I just pushed that head to the back of my workbench. One day last month I found it, it's probably been laying around for at least seven years now, and decided I was going to finish her. This little girls is life size which is kind of unusual for me because I generally make everything at least as a magnum. The head and body are basswood.
View attachment P1310265.jpg.
And my third bird that I'll show you this month is a hen black duck I started way back in the spring of last year. It's and order for a fellow and I wanted to make my black duck very different than what he could get from anyone else. I have distorted and exaggerated some of the shapes and she looks pretty aggressive to me. I started painting this decoy in the late spring to early summer of last year and thing were going well, and then I just lost the concept of where I wanted to go with the colors. So often I see people depict black ducks as just dark browns, but if you have ever spent and time studying them you find that they are much more complexly colored than just that. So after a six month hiatus I got back to painting this decoy. What I did was to underlay a lot of color in the paint ranging from dark green into a red fazed purple and then a purple/blue. I've over glazed those with a color called Brown Madder which has a very red tone to it. What I'm trying to achieve is for the colors to shift as light hits it when the viewer holds it and adjust it in his hands.
There has been a lot written about what the speculum on a black duck should look like. From what I've read a 100% black duck has a dark edge to end of the secondary feathers. Mallard/Black Duck hybrids show a slight whitening to a full white stripe depending on what part of the country you are in. Here in Western Pennsylvania our black ducks must be pretty well hybridized because the ones I see all have some degree of white on those feathers. I painted my speculum using underlying light blues and gradually darkened those with French Ultra Marine Blue and then finished with and over glaze of a purple that I made up with some of the FUM Blue and a color called Rose Madder. Again I was trying to achieve that shifting of color when it is expose to different light. Ultimately I decide to make the back edge of the speculum a dark black with the idea that this hen is 100% black duck. Here is where I'm at with that decoy this morning.
View attachment P1310266.jpg.
Here is the expose wing and tertial/scapular areas.
View attachment P1310267.jpg.
So this is where I'm at on my current decoys this month.
What's on your Workbench this February?
My personal theme for this month is to finish up a lot of decoys that have been sitting around partially finished, some for a number of years. Frequently I'll get an idea and sketch it out then cut maybe the head and carve it. Then something more important will become my priority. Every once in a while I'll move something and find one of those heads and I'll remember that original concept and start to think I need to work on this more.
My first two birds that I'll show you this month are in that vein. First up is that 2x10 redhead that I posted the beginnings of in January. I started the head at the Pymatuning show in '10. I glued up the pieces of the body in late December of last year and had full intentions of having it done by now. After a couple of adjustments to the head size and neck the whole look has changed and I have an alert high headed drake. I've been spending a lot of time on a web page called Wetcanvas recently. It a comprehensive artist's web page and I've been studying the Landscapes and Plein Air sections in particular. I particularly like the looser styles of paint you can find there.What I think I'm going to do is go for a freer more simple look to the bird, at least at this point anyway. Here is that drake redhead made from basswood and 2x10s from the Home Depot.
View attachment P1310262.jpg.
View attachment P1310263.jpg.
Years ago a group of guys and I were entering what we called the "Buddy Rig" at Westlake. The idea was just to have six guys all make one decoy in our own style and put them in the six bird rig contest. The first year we did buffleheads and we didn't even get to float them because a couple of the guys didn't quite understand the rules that they use. When we were getting close to the show it looked like one fellow wasn't going to be able to finish his hen so I started a hen just in case. He ended up finishing his bird and I just pushed that head to the back of my workbench. One day last month I found it, it's probably been laying around for at least seven years now, and decided I was going to finish her. This little girls is life size which is kind of unusual for me because I generally make everything at least as a magnum. The head and body are basswood.
View attachment P1310265.jpg.
And my third bird that I'll show you this month is a hen black duck I started way back in the spring of last year. It's and order for a fellow and I wanted to make my black duck very different than what he could get from anyone else. I have distorted and exaggerated some of the shapes and she looks pretty aggressive to me. I started painting this decoy in the late spring to early summer of last year and thing were going well, and then I just lost the concept of where I wanted to go with the colors. So often I see people depict black ducks as just dark browns, but if you have ever spent and time studying them you find that they are much more complexly colored than just that. So after a six month hiatus I got back to painting this decoy. What I did was to underlay a lot of color in the paint ranging from dark green into a red fazed purple and then a purple/blue. I've over glazed those with a color called Brown Madder which has a very red tone to it. What I'm trying to achieve is for the colors to shift as light hits it when the viewer holds it and adjust it in his hands.
There has been a lot written about what the speculum on a black duck should look like. From what I've read a 100% black duck has a dark edge to end of the secondary feathers. Mallard/Black Duck hybrids show a slight whitening to a full white stripe depending on what part of the country you are in. Here in Western Pennsylvania our black ducks must be pretty well hybridized because the ones I see all have some degree of white on those feathers. I painted my speculum using underlying light blues and gradually darkened those with French Ultra Marine Blue and then finished with and over glaze of a purple that I made up with some of the FUM Blue and a color called Rose Madder. Again I was trying to achieve that shifting of color when it is expose to different light. Ultimately I decide to make the back edge of the speculum a dark black with the idea that this hen is 100% black duck. Here is where I'm at with that decoy this morning.
View attachment P1310266.jpg.
Here is the expose wing and tertial/scapular areas.
View attachment P1310267.jpg.
So this is where I'm at on my current decoys this month.
What's on your Workbench this February?
