Painting a Wigeon Head with Spencer Tinkham, Part 2

Text and photographs by Spencer Tinkham 

Spencer Tinkham completes his Wigeon head. In Part 1, Tinkham gave step-by-step instructions on carving the head, and now he paints the project. 

Painting a Wigeon Head with Spencer Tinkham

1.  Gesso.

2.  Lightly spot sand (take out rough spots) with 120-grit.

3.  Paint second coat of gesso.

4.  Apply base coat of 85% Gesso (white-W) so paint will have something to grab, 10% black, 5% beige, touch of purple.

5.  Blend out by placing water above where you want to blend, drag brush into water. Final blending can be done by dabbing a paper towel on the desired area.

6.  The end product.

7.  If necessary, touch up with a little paint.

8.  Draw flow lines with a Prisma water color pencil.

9.  Paint fine squiggles on underside of head using 50/50 Black (BL) and Burnt Umber (BU).

10.  Now start to bring the lines up by the bill, still following flow lines.

11.  Keep following flow lines.

12.  Bring the squiggles farther back.

13.  Apply 60% Bu and 40% BL around eye, and blend out into squiggles.

14.  Apply two coats of 80% Green, 10% BL, and 10% BU.

15.  Bring squiggles up by eye, and into green.

16.  Thicken the color on the back of the head with the same dark mixture.

17.  Join the back of the head to the squiggles above the green.

18.  Start to fade squiggles from back of head into the white crown. (Use different watery mixtures to create more depth.)

19.  Fade green out into the squiggles use straight green.

20.  Apply straight green to highlight some of the existing green, and then blend a little Hansa Yellow light wet on wet to further highlight the green a little.

21.  Wash around eye with dark squiggle mixture (NO PICTURE)- When everything is dry add a little red to the back of the green patch NOT TOO MUCH, less is more here.

22.  Paint bill with 85% W, 10% gray blue, and 5 % BU WIDGEON BILLS ARE NOT NEON BLUE!!!!

23.  Paint tongue with 60% W, 15% gray blue, 15% red, 5% BU.

24.  Paint lower mandible carbon black.

25.  Paint black on upper mandible, and blend gray blue into front 1/3 of bill.- AGAIN apply water just above where you want to blend, drag brush into water, and finish it up by touching it up with a damp paper towel (or your finger).

26.  Paint nostrils black NOTE- wash black into nostrils so that you won’t get black all over bill while trying to wiggle the paint in there.  Your brush should put a few watery drops of black into the nostril.Paint notches in tongue by adding a touch of BU into the tongue mixture and finely painting.

27.  Paint shoulder with 60% medium beige, 40% Burnt Sienna.

28.  Wash BU onto the top of the shoulder to darken it.

29.  Vermiculate with 60% BU 40% BL.

30.  Wash head with equal parts of BU, BL, and W (try not to paint too much on the green, but definitely paint the white crown, WIDGEON HEADS ARE NOT BRIGHT WHITE, NOR ARE THEY A SOLID GOLDEN COLOR, a little raw sienna wash may be added the front part of the crown to give it a SLIGHT gold sheen).

31.  Add a little watered down white to the green to fade it out a bit more.

32.  Take paint off eye and you’re done, don’t forget to sign it.

GOOD LUCK on the Wigeon!  This is a quick and easy process that anyone can do.  It is a great way to get new carvers involved, and is something that is “easy to get rid of” if you want a few extra bucks, or are making it as a gift as I was.  Making “book end heads” is a great way to practice on what I see as the most important part of the whole bird: the head.  The carving process took me about 2 ½ hours and painting took around 3 hours.  Though you don’t have to photograph your carving as I did, it should take around 4 ½ -6 hrs to complete this (with breaks).