Red Breasted Geese

On Saturday my mum and I visited the WWT reserve in Barnes, West London. It was a beautiful sunny day, and perfect for watching all the lovely wildlife there. My favourite wildfowl there were the Eider Ducks, and these colourful Red-Breasted Geese. They were lit up by the late afternoon sun, and just crying out to be painted!
This was quite an ambitious image for me to paint in watercolour. Water is one of the trickiest things to paint, especially when coupled with reflections. I took inspiration from Lars Johnson's watercolours of wildfowl. He uses simple loose brushstrokes on wet washes to produce a loose impression of the bird in the water. He also uses the white of the paper to illuminate the subject. I have a habit of covering even the white parts of my subjects with colour, so I wanted to try this method instead. I am quite pleased with this image as it is my first painting since the summer!
The red, black and white of these birds make a lovely contrast, and I will probably re-visit them again to paint, but first I am going to try some Eiders.