Uffington Hare

The new picture, following on from the Questing Vole, shows a hare looking up at Lepus, the constellation of the hare, below Orion and pursued by Sirius (though you can't see them in this pic, just in case you were looking). I drew the picture then scanned it and coloured it using Paint Shop Pro. This is good for those deep, smooth colours, as you see; I'd made two starts at this picture using watercolour, and put them aside as it just wasn't the medium for the picture I had in mind. 

As several people asked if it was going to be available as a card, I thought I'd better get some printed up; the cards won't be ready for a few days yet, but I've just picked up some prints and they can be got here on Etsy

Flying Fish

 

Sometimes, it's nice to do something a bit different, and paint a picture from your imagination. I did this picture last week; I saw flying fish and phosphorescence in the Indian Ocean ten years ago, and I used to have a little boat rather like this one, and still have the storm lantern. But that's as far as actual events go. That's the House Teenager there at the tiller....

There's a print of it over on Etsy.

Here's the first flying fish I ever saw; it had landed on deck during the night. It wasn't long after that I saw groups of them, flying out of the way of the boat as we zoomed along; their wings stretched out tight and shiny in the sunlight.

..and this is a drawing of plankton flashing as we zoomed by; I think this is called bioluminescence, and I don't know enough about it to know if it's a different thing from phosphorescence.... it was like silent fireworks, exploding underwater. And, like so much else far out in the ocean, it was something rich and strange.