How To Draw: Birds In Flight

Birds move around by flying using their wings to power themselves up into the air. They are transformed when they take flight, but to draw them on the move like this can be tricky. As you are drawing them as if they were in the air, you will notice that this is harder to draw than when they are posing on the ground or on a branch. The wings' movements and body positions mean there are endless ways to draw a bird flying. So, lets start with the basics, drawing a wing.

Stage One

As we have so far drawn birds with their wings tucked away, I need to show you how to draw a wing. Wings come in many shapes depending on what bird you are drawing and how it uses those wings. Some are broad and long to keep them airbourne with barely a flap and to soar effortlessly for miles. Others have pointed wingtips to make them streamlined and fly at high speeds. But I am going to draw a typical wing that most garden birds have.

Your basic wing shape is created by first drawing a rough square/rectangle next to the bird's body. Then draw a long, downward arch for the main flight feathers. Draw a line from more than half way down that square and curve it upwards when you reach the top of the flight feather area. It should look like a rectangle and a small arch at the top of your wing.


Stage Two

Next, create tiers of downward lines at the top of your wing with a 'thumb' at the end. The lower half of the wing (on the square-shape half), devide that band at the bottom with wide spaces. The main flight feathers, called primaries, are like the bird's fingers with a little feather at the top, then a few longer ones going down the wing. You need to draw long rectangles with pointed ends. Then go over in pen and rub out the pencil marks.

 To help you out a bit, I have labeled and coloured each area of feathers to help you learn each section of the wing. Primaries are long flight feathers that flex and steer the bird in the air. Secondaries are like smaller flight feathers that helps the bird to glide. The coverts and primary coverts are areas of feathers that cover the wing and provides insulation. The alula is basically the bird's 'thumb'.








Stage One

 When it comes to drawing birds in flight, there are many ways to do it. It all depends on what you want the bird doing. Do you want it to hover, dive, soar, flap or swoop? I have decided to show a few examples on one page of various ways a bird can fly, but all are simple to plan out to begin with. As you can see, I have drawn either the basic bird body and head like in my previous drawings or a bow and arrow line drawing (top). For the wings, I have drawn either 'U', 'V' or 'M'-shapes. The one in the top centre, is just a long line with a circle in the middle to show it soaring towards me.


Stage Two

Next up is to draw the basic shape of each bird. For the wings, follow the stages I've gone through earlier. Just draw round the lines to make squares and triangles. Some are positioned so that the wings point out in front of their heads. Others are pointed down towards their tails. The drawing on the top right is hovering and each wing is pointed in different directions above it's body. One wing is drawn slightly bigger than the other to show distance to us (one wing is closer to our perspective, etc). The same goes to the drawing on the bottom centre.








Stage Three

If you are not happy with the way your drawing looks like, as I was with the top two drawings, play around a bit with the wing's position, etc, until you are satisfied. It easy to get frustrated, but keep at it and be patient, you will get it the way you want it in the end. As you can see on my hovering bird (top right), I have changed my mind on what it should become. I have decided that it will now be a skylark. I have also decided that it's wing facing away to us will be half tucked away from view and is now looking like a stump from what it was originally. All the drawings are taking shape with detail to the wings' feather structure and tail feathers being added.





Stage Four

Stage Four is to re-draw in pen and add more detail to each bird's plumage. Remember to rub out the pencil marks and to add the detail by shading lightly or heavily in each part of the bird to show light and shadow and plumage shades.

Finally, colour in your bird. And there you have it. From top to bottom we have; a blue tit swooping downwards, a skylark hovering, a fulmar soaring towards us, two collard doves (one showing the underside and the other it's upperside) and a diving Arctic tern. I hope this has helped you with your drawings and remember to keep practicing, you will get better eventually, just have patience. Until next time (which I will move away from drawing birds), good luck with your drawings!