Fuzzy, fast-moving, baby chicks are adorable and fun to paint. They are so easy, too. To gain confidence, draw chicks first, then switch to paints and create chicks directly in the paint, without drawing first. If you can paint two yellow balls, you can paint chicks. It’s amazing what character you can give these little guys with just a few quick finishing strokes of the brush.
Steps
Part 1
Part 1 of 2:
Preparing
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Do a little research. Look at kid’s books for illustrations of baby chicks. Go online and look at images of actual yellow chicks to see how they look. Check out how other watercolor artists have depicted baby chicks.
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Draw some chicks. On good quality sketch paper, draw a large circle for the body and a smaller one, slightly overlapping for the head. Add the details: beak, eye(s), legs and feet with three long toes. Erase the guidelines.Advertisement
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Practice shading a few of the chicks. Shading in pencil will help you to become comfortable with where the shading goes when you paint it on.
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Decide what environment you want the chicks to have. It could be a barnyard, inside a barn, a yard with grass, flowers, weeds, etc. You might just jot down ideas and do small sketches of various backgrounds.
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Practice how to do the chicken wire. Search up what chicken wire looks like or try to find some to get the layout and texture of it. Afterward, try drawing it a few times to get the hang of it. When you know how then, try painting it.Advertisement
Part 2
Part 2 of 2:
Painting the Chicks
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1Check out various shades of yellow. You might be surprised how many are out there. You might have to use one of the mail order art stores for some of the yellows that are less common. However, you can use just one yellow from your paint box or watercolor tubes.
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On a piece of watercolor paper, without sketching first, make some chicks. Repeat what you did on the practice paper except instead of drawing the outlines of circles, you will be painted bright yellow balls. Jump right into painting chicks. Set fear and trepidation aside for the moment. Load a #8 or larger pointed brush and paint two yellow circles, one small for the head and one larger for the body. Try to do this with as few strokes as possible and avoid going back over them or editing them. Work from a puddle of yellow you’ve made and fully load your brush to keep the painting wet looking and juicy. Avoid the look of dryness. This way the shapes will remain fresh and vibrant.
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3Paint the chick bodies first. Try to configure these yellow ball chicks in as many ways as you can think of to show movement, and gestures of the chicks. Paint as many chicks as you wish. Give them irregular spacing. Make the ones closer to the viewer slightly larger and have the chicks be smaller as they recede into the background. Doing a lot of these 2 ball chicks (head and body forms) first before adding details makes the black details against the yellow paint less apt to run and spoil the yellow. Allow them to dry.
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Do another pass to shade the bodies of the chicks. This time use darker yellow or light brown. Load your brush from a puddle you’ve made of the paint and swipe across the edges of the circles to create the illusion of roundness. Let this dry. Add the beak, eyes, legs and four toes. Use a small, pointed brush and black or dark brown paint. For the beak, a short stroke for the upper part and one for the bottom. For the eye(s) a small dot. The legs are two short lines with three fanned outlines for the toes.
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5If you wish, take the safe way by drawing the chicks first in pencil. This allows you to take time setting up your design and making as many corrections as you need to. Then, paint them with yellow paint.
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6Plan and sketch how to fill the areas around the birds. With a pencil, lightly draw in your environment. If you are unsure what to do, look at images of chicks on the internet for ideas and see where they might live. Also, look at coloring pages of chicks for clear line drawings. You might include, a chicken house, fencing in wood or chicken wire, a water bowl, a feed sack, grass, weeds, flowers, eggs, other big chickens, etc.
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Finish and display your painting. At the holiday table, you might use the chicks to decorate a place card. Ask each guest to caption the chick by writing on the card in fine line black marker. Guests can just sign their names. Or, you can put the names on each card ahead of time to designate places at the table.Advertisement
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Tips
- Add other chicks, baby ducks, and a chicken or a rooster.Thanks
- Make a table runner: Have a long strip of watercolor on a table. Make one by cutting a piece of watercolor paper lengthwise and joining them together with tape. Provide all kinds of art supplies, black and colored markers, colored and water-soluble pencils, even two sizes of yellow construction paper balls, glue sticks. Ask each person or guest to draw or paint one or two baby chicks along the strip. Facing in one direction and then the opposite. If you plan to stand it up, on the backside, in colored marker, write out a spring quotation or saying you make up by trailing the writing or printing all along the length of the paper strip.Thanks
- Baby chickens do come in other colors, mottled gray, brown and solid brown and black.Thanks
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