Wood Pigeon Screen Test

wood pigeon cartoons

For his waddle-on cameo in my Ode to a Duck cartoon, the wood pigeon is supposed to be empathic and concerned rather than ranting and irate, but, if you’re familiar with wood pigeons you’ll know that they have a limited repertoire.

wood pigeon roughs

The line work was drawn in Lamy fountain pen in my sketchbook. I’ve combined two of my sketches and coloured them in Photoshop. I kept testing the Photoshop PSD file in Adobe Character Animator, to make sure things were turning out more or less as intended.

I haven’t added the blink yet, as I did for the squirrel this morning, but this character is evidently the unblinking sort.

Next up, a foraging moorhen . . .

Wood pigeon mouth positions
Wood pigeon mouth movements – and yes, I know that they don’t really have teeth! – drawn same size as my original sketch.

Squirrel Screen Test

squirrel cartoons

My latest sketchbook-to-screen character is the beech mast-gathering squirrel, partially inspired by seeing enthusiastic gardener and seed-collector Carol Klein on last night’s Gardeners’ World. I’d love to get her to do the voice-over.

Fox Cam

Fox cam still

The last time we caught the fox on the trail cam was at 10.30, two nights ago, in the back garden.

sketches from last night's trail cam footage
Sketches from last night’s trail cam footage.

Last night it didn’t show but wood pigeon, magpie and Boris, a neighbour’s cat, triggered it between six and eight this morning.

fox scat and pigeon feathers

Apparently all the action was in our front garden. This morning a cluster of wood pigeon breast feathers and a pile of fox scats were all the evidence left by whatever drama took place under the rowan tree between dusk and dawn.

Spoonbill

bittern

On Friday at St Aidan’s we saw spoonbill, ruff, heron and bittern. A birdwatcher suggested that the adult spoonbills from the small colony at Fairburn Ings fly over to St Aidan’s to take a break from the juveniles.

As the ruff had a black bill, it was probably a female. We’re now into the autumn migration, so hopefully we’ll see a few more waders at the shallower ponds.

Designer Phragmites

Growing by watersides, reed canary-grass, Phalaris arundinacea, looks like a diminutive version of the common reed, Phragmites, and has been dubbed canal grass. At this time of year, some of the seedheads are flushed with purple, so it deserves its nickname of designer Phragmites.

Gipsywort

gipsywort
common blue

Growing alongside the Phalaris, gipsywort, Lycopus europaeus, which has been in herbal medicine and to produce a black dye.

There are dozens of dragonflies about and a few butterflies, including this common blue, taking a brief rest on the path.

Ducking

duck cartoons

We’ve started shooting, and the duck’s looking a bit worried about that.

I’ve dived in to the mysteries of Adobe Character Animator and I like the way the simple ‘puppets’ that you create in the program can be so expressive. Other aspects such as how to stop the character floating about are a mystery – although the duck might be quite relieved to hear that.

Lip-sync and bill-sync are working well though.

Ode to a Duck

duck
T'was the last week of summer
And, down by the lake,
We hear the sad quack
Of a hungry old drake.
grebe
The grebes and the tufted ducks
Dabble and dive
But our poor drake is struggling
Just to survive.
juvenile grebe
The foraging moorhen
Has plenty of luck,
But that doesn't extend
To the desolate duck.
goose
In the woods, the grey squirrels
Eat beech-nuts galore,
But our poor drake is starving
Down here on the shore.
grebe and duck

I know what you’re thinking:
‘I’ll give him some bread!’ –
But just one mouldy bread crust
Can leave a duck dead.

ducks
This ode to a duck
Might not be the best,
But what were you expecting? -
I'm not Colin West!
duck

Cartoon ducks drawn at Newmillerdam this morning. We didn’t see any drake mallards in breeding plumage, so my guess is that they’re all in eclipse plumage, and we’ll see their true colours appear in the autumn.

Branched Bur-reed

ivy-covered trunk of ash tree

As we walk down the Balk from Netherton on a still, grey Sunday morning, the only sound coming across the Calder Valley is the peel of bells from the spire of Horbury’s Georgian Church of St Peter’s. The bells were recast a year ago and we can hear the difference in harmony. Not that I thought they were out of tune before but there was a bit of a clanking abruptness when they were ringing; the arpeggios are smoother now.

On the bank of the stream at the lower end of The Balk, ivy stems climb the trunk of this ash tree as luxuriantly as a strangler fig in a rain forest.

bur-reed

Branched bur-reed, Sparganium erectum, grows by the canal bank, alongside The Strands, in the valley at Horbury Bridge. After engineering work to repair locks and drains damaged by flooding in February last year, the Canal & River Trust did some dredging along this stretch of the Calder and Hebble Navigation. Floating vegetation and marginals have soon colonised this quiet stretch but now most Covid restrictions have been lifted, we’re seeing more narrowboats, which help keep it clear.

mycena fungi on alder

A little further along, where trees grow alongside the canal, Mycena fungi grow on the stump of a sawn-off alder growing from the bank.

Lost in Space

spaceman animation

James, appearing on my most recent homemade birthday card, is the plucky test pilot for my latest experiment in animation. Like the fox, this was adapted from an existing pen and watercolour comic, using Clip Studio Paint on the iMac and on my iPad Pro. It’s a whole lot easier to cut out the component parts using an Apple Pencil for the Selection Pen and Eraser.