I saw a pair of these beautiful wood ducks briefly in our pond in the spring. So when local, talented photographer Nancy Steed Wilcox posted her fabulous image of a Wood Duck Drake, I knew I wanted to try painting it (with permission to use her source photo, thanks Nancy)!

The reflection was fun, as the ripples in the water caused interesting repetitions of the features.

The trickiest part was trying to capture the iridescence in the wood duck drake’s feathers, especially on the head and cheeks. I decide to try something new. I applied some imitation gold leaf flakes on the parts I wanted to enhance the iridescence. After letting it dry, I painted a bit more of the oil colours using a medium for transparency and gloss over top of the gold leaf. I think it worked to enhance it.

My friend Phil Chadwick, who happened to be painting a wood duck drake at the same time, said, “Excellent Catherine… That is one very happy wood duck. You somehow included the emotion of the beautiful bird!”