Chapter 5: Avain Flight

I'll admit, Avian Flight was harder to digest than the other chapters. I learned about lift, the force of acting on a moving airfoil, another cool term, perpendicular to the direction of airflow. In the case for birds, that moving airfoil is a bird's wing. Birds wings' help them create lift with a special curved design in their wing shape, called a wing chord.  There's a bunch of stuff about dynamic pressure that made me feels as if I were in physics class, not a biology book, but it's amazing how everything in science is connected. Birds are so well adapted for flight, every aspect of their body is design to be aerodynamic. Birds' tail-feathers even reduce drag pressure and helps to direct airflow in flight.

Barn Swallow sketch, 9x12 graphite on paper

There's of course hovering, which not all birds can do (hummingbirds can!). The chapter covered aerodynamic power, the type of flapping to create certain speeds, minimum and maximum range speeds, and even types of soaring. 

While all of this info was interesting, I was definitely more interested in the visual aspects of flight, and I really loved how part of the chapter focused on soaring. The book really explain well how birds like our native Turkey Vulture can stay in the air for so long, even on super windy days! I 'm always so scared that one is going to get pushed by a gust of wind into the road and get hurt. What I learned though, was that even our vultures are adapted well to this scenario:

Cornell Lab of Ornithology: Handbook of Bird Biology, Third Ed. Chapter 5, page 163

Cornell Lab of Ornithology: Handbook of Bird Biology, Third Ed. Chapter 5, page 166

When birds like vulture soar, they're wings are not extended to lie completely flat. Instead, they create a dihedral (upturned "V") wing posture to accomplish passive roll stability. If a gust of wind displaces a bird and causes a sideslip velocity downward in one direction, the angle of velocity increases in the opposite wing and effective lift is greater  in the original wing....basically it evens itself out and allows the bird to avoid rolling in mid-air -- This stuff is hard to explain!

Of course, here's a Turkey Vulture to enjoy after all that info about soaring: enjoy!

Turkey Vulture in Flight sketch, 9x12 graphite on paper

This project is made possible by support of the Indiana Arts Commission, a state agency.

Chapter 4: Feathers & Plumages

Fun, fun feathers! Still trying to catch up with my posts, but this chapter was one I could stay with for a long time. A while back, I read a book on bird coloration by National Geogrpahic and was fascinated with the study of color, light, and pigments in bird's feathers. I highly recommend the book which you can get here on Amazon:

National Geographic Bird Coloration
by Geoffrey E. Hill

Since I already had some background knowledge on coloration, this chapter was a lot easier to read and process. Sketching was also fun, as it went over types of feathers:

Feather Type Variations, 9x12 graphite on paper

As well as some of the basics of bird feather anatomy:

Remiges & Retrices, 9x12 graphite on paper

In the sketch above, feather tracts are divided by which bones they originate from. Remiges are flight feathers that form from the bone of the wing bone. Primary feathers are sub-grouped to the outer wing forming from the manus whereas secondaries form the inner wing from the ulna bone. by contrast, retrices are flight feathers that originate from the tail bone. All of these feathers help to form the airfoil design that allows birds to fly.

There is so much more to this chapter but I'm going to focus on taking tests and paintings for now. More posts to follow!

This project is made possible by support of the Indiana Arts Commission, a state agency.

Chapter 3: How Birds Evolve

So, like I mentioned before, I'll be moving quickly through these chapters to meet my deadline. Full disclosure: I am NOT reading, taking quizzes, sketching, and posting as quickly as it looks.

The chapters are definitely getting longer and more thorough. This chapter covered natural and sexual selection, speciation, hybridization, divergence of bird populations, and adaptive radiations of birds. Without going into the nitty-gritty details of the entire section, here are a few highlights that caught my attention:

Cornell Lab of Ornithology: Handbook of Bird Biology, Third Ed. Chapter 3, page 

64-65

Most people are familiar with the common household pet Budgerigars, or parakeet, and I am not an exception. In fact, I have a pet Budgie right now named Kiwi who I've cared for about 12 years. In the section above detailing the four conditions for natural selection, there is a small box (3.01) that details on how each bird has their own unique traits to that particular individual. The photo they show in the book makes it difficult to determine each individual budgie in a giant flock, but it made me look really closely at Kiwi to see if I could determine some of her own unique characteristics. You can tell her dad was a typically colored budgie, but her mom was a blue/white coloring, lacking the yellow pigment in her feathers. Maybe I can't see what other birds see, but she's cute to look at regardless!

Kiwi, my budgie, on her swing! 💚

While the information in the book is really useful and relevant to the bird biology course, sometimes I feel like I am gaining more value in simply learning about new species that I have never seen or heard about. For example, in the section regarding sexual selection, this photo of a nighthawk from the savannas of central Africa caught my attention:

Cornell Lab of Ornithology: Handbook of Bird Biology, Third Ed. Chapter 3, top of page 71

You have to look closely to see what is written in the caption, but these nighthawks have developed flag-like extension of their secondary flight feathers for attracting mates. Obviously, this beautiful trait can be cumbersome to bird that relies on catching insects on the wing, but HOW COOL! I had to look up some more images of them to see the ornamental feathers in flight and sketch my findings.

Standard-winged Nighthawks in Flight sketch, 9x12, graphite on paper

Speciation is the evolutionary process by which one ancestral lineage splits into two or more descendants species. The book describes how allopatric speciation (speciation in populations that occur in separate regions with no geographic overlap) probably caused the divergence of certain hummingbird species in South America's mainland and islands. While not specifically mentioned in the text, it reminded me how hummingbirds are a definitive species of the Americas, not found on any other continent across the globe. Makes our native Ruby-throated Hummingbirds here in NW Indiana seem pretty special, so I found a great image reference and sketched one. I think I might turn it into a painting.

Ruby-throated Hummingbird (female) in flight sketch, 9x12, graphite on paper

Chapter 4 is on Feathers and Plumages-- Stay tuned for more sketches and notes!

This project is made possible by support of the Indiana Arts Commission, a state agency.

Chapter 2: Avian Diversity & Classification

Back on track!

Chapter 2, as mentioned in the previous post, was a highly anticipated chapter for me. I like to skim the chapters before I read them to get a quick overview of what I'll be reading. While that is helpful, I tend to get stuck on the small captions with interesting images or diagrams (which helps when I take the quizzes, but is super distracting!). Because of this,  I knew the evolution of birds and their ancestry to dinosaurs were going to be covered in this chapter. (Yay!)

Just to be brief, this chapter covered everything from phylogeny, classification, defining a species, genetic variation, and avian diversity to the origins of birds, extinction, and avian orders and families. The origin of birds through the evolution of certain bipedal theropods (Maniraptora), was a fascinating read. Of course, not all dinosaurs are bird descendants, but all birds can be proven to be descendants from particular dinosaurs. I've already been familiar with some extinct species of early birds, moas, dodos, etc, but I was eager to learn about other, earlier descendants, such as Confuciusornis, Hesperornis, and Ichthyornis.

Sketch of Skeleton of Hesperornis, 9x12, graphite

As an young artist, I loved studying the animals I loved through their skeletal and muscular structures, sketching from anatomy books from my library (and scaring some of my art teachers!). While I was just drawing what I thought was interesting, I now realize that I wanted to learn more about what was going on underneath what I was drawing on the surface of these animals. I've credited this early interest in anatomy to helping me draw well, along with being able to draw a lot from memory. This knowledge helped to create more fantastic beings too, including dragons, basilisks, and other creatures. Since I had the excuse to, I created my own rendition of a bird-like Maniraptoran, likely one of the earliest "bird-dinosaurs." Even while not 100% accurate, I still enjoyed the challenge!

Artist's Interpretation of Maniraptoran, 9x12, graphite on paper

More sketches (add color studies!) to follow soon -- Next Chapter is How Birds Evolve!

This project is made possible by support of the Indiana Arts Commission, a state agency.

Chapter 1: Part II (....It's a Long Story)

So.....

It's pretty obvious Chapter 2 shouldn't have been this long. I've had some health issues at the beginning of 2019 slow my progress with this project. It's a long story -- but the good news is that I am back on track, and the Indiana Arts Commission was kind enough to allow me an extension to finish my project.

Apparently, I'm much faster at reading and taking quizzes than I am drawing and painting. I'm much farther in my reading than it looks, so I'm going to have to catch up quickly from here to be able to complete on-time.

While I am already done with Chapter 1 and its quizzes, I thought at least I'd show some of the sketches I've been working on from the beginning. This book introduced me to the Club-winged Manakin, which I am completely enchanted with. They choose the right species to start the book with, as it reminds us bird-lovers why these animals are so special. This bird, native to South America, uses specialized feathers to create sound! Here's a video of the bird displaying:

Here are a few sketches I created to celebrate this bird and get a better visual of their unique feathers:

Club-winged Manakin Sketch, graphite, 9x12

In-Progress: Club-winged Manakin (feather detail) Sketch, graphite, 9x12

Photo reference from: https://academy.allaboutbirds.org/feathers-article/club-winged_manakin_feather/

Chapter 2:Avian Diversity and Classification is next. In this chapter, the authors describe birds evolutionary story as well as what makes birds, well, birds! That means dinosaurs, Archaepteryx, and other extinct bird species.....a favorite topic of mine! Hope you'll stay with me as I race to get the last of the chapters finished and sketches completed!

This project is made possible by support of the Indiana Arts Commission, a state agency.

Let's Begin! Chapter 1: Why Study Birds?

Earlier this year, I wrote a grant proposal through the Indiana Arts Commission to take the Cornell Lab of Ornithology's online Ornithology: Comprehensive Bird Biology course and document my studies with sketches and paintings to record the visual process of my learning and share (at the end) via exhibition. I'm happy to announce that I did receive the grant, and am currently starting my course online and quickly finished Chapter 1 (it was a short chapter to be fair).

Cornell's Ornithology: Comprehensive Bird Biology Course (Greater Bird of Paradise)

For the next several weeks, be prepared to get a little nerdy with me as I share my drawings, doodles, paintings, and random murmurings on my blog of each chapter of this course. First Chapter: Why Study Birds? That's easy!

Chapter 1: Why Study Birds?

The first chapter was short and sweet. It definitely felt it was trying to get me amped up for the rest of the book, which I assume can become a bit dry for some. However, I think this course is going to me more exciting for someone who is already interested in birds and/ or is a birder, as this information becomes more relevant and easy to digest. I'll do my best to share my enthusiasm with you as I'm learning, and while I hope you enjoy the drawings and paintings that are sure to come, I hope that you discover something new along the way too

Alongside the textbook for the online course came a series of videos and online quizzes that I'll be taking as I progress. No quiz this chapter, but there were some great videos on some really neat birds. My favorite was learning about a South American bird called the Club-winged Manakin. This bird uses its secondary flight feathers to produce a sound similar to how cricket makes a "chirping" noise. I'll definitively be making some more sketches of this bird.

More to come soon. I got a late start on this and with the holidays coming up I have a few commissions to wrap before I can justify moving forward with Chapter 2. I'll make a few more sketches and post them here within the next few weeks and hopefully get a handful of quizzes done before the end of December. More images to follow!

Take the course with me:
https://academy.allaboutbirds.org/product/ornithology-comprehensive-bird-biology/

This project is made possible by support of the Indiana Arts Commission, a state agency.

Endangered Coastal California Gnatcatcher diptych

2015: Time to get back on track. Life in general is starting to slow down and my time for painting opening up more and more. I'm excited to start working more diligently and attack new projects. My most recently finished painting was a commission I worked on for a collector who was looking for paintings of endangered bird species of North America. This diptych features a female and male California Coastal Gnatcatcher:

Coastal California Gnatcatcher diptych (female left, male right).
Watercolor on paper adhered to canvas.
Two panels 8 X 10 in each. Copyright Kristina Knowski 2015.

I have another opportunity to design and create a mural for this client as well for her bathroom. I'm working on sketches now, but will have some ideas posted soon.

P. S. Be prepared for some amazing photos from my new camera/ scope adapter!