Quetzal watercolor

The quetzal is the national bird of Guatamala, as well as being on their flag. The more colorful one, shown here, is the male. The reason that I decided to paint this though is because my nephew's daughter is named after the bird. She is graduating in June and I thought a painting of her name-sake would be a cool present.

This painting actually took longer than most because I got "stuck" several times. It started with having to alter my reference photo because it was too long for my paper. I curled the tail feathers to accomodate it all. Feathers have always been a little intimidating, but I think that I depicted them quite well. Then the background got too muddy, but I lifted some of the paint to create a jungle backdrop. Now my challenge is to find a frame that this odd sized painting will fit into.