Oh Hai- Beaks

A 10 minute sketch with Prismacolor pencil of a Keel-Billed-Toucan. You may wonder why I'm sketching such a colourful animal in monochrome. The answer is before I start experimenting with colour, I want to get a feel for the shape and anatomy of the animal.






The Keel-Billed Toucan has been called the bird with the world's most colourful beak. It's also Belize's national bird and appears on the belizean currency.






I'm wondering if the specimens will have retained that colour. (Not sure what methods of preveseration the museum have used yet for the dry specimens, or how through they are.)

I'm wondering this because this is a Keel Billed Toucan skull, and when you compare the live bird with the skull, a lot of the colour seems to have drained from it, which implies to me that blood vessels in the vascular layer are responsible for the brightness.





More on toucan beaks here.

x-posted to belizebirdnhm

Oh Hai- Beaks

A 10 minute sketch with Prismacolor pencil of a Keel-Billed-Toucan. You may wonder why I'm sketching such a colourful animal in monochrome. The answer is before I start experimenting with colour, I want to get a feel for the shape and anatomy of the animal.






The Keel-Billed Toucan has been called the bird with the world's most colourful beak. It's also Belize's national bird and appears on the belizean currency.






I'm wondering if the specimens will have retained that colour. (Not sure what methods of preveseration the museum have used yet for the dry specimens, or how through they are.)

I'm wondering this because this is a Keel Billed Toucan skull, and when you compare the live bird with the skull, a lot of the colour seems to have drained from it, which implies to me that blood vessels in the vascular layer are responsible for the brightness.





More on toucan beaks here.

x-posted to belizebirdnhm