The young hawk

Just completed the second of my 'close up' paintings. This is a young red-backed hawk, whilst thinking about how this would work I got caught up with the idea of a flowing shape created from the lie of his feathers, the eye and is the focal point and the beak a hard element that breaks out of the softenss of the curve.

Reference photo:

Finished painting:

Feeling a bit chuffed with the 'flowing curve' idea when it occured to me that I'd seen this before...and I had, months ago in a doodle I'd done whilst talking to someone on the phone, funny how your mind works isn't it. I'd forgotten about this but the idea must have still been in there somewhere.

Doodle: