nmdart.com

nmdart.com

9.05.2016

Day #5 of 5 Hecale Longwing

If you followed along with me for the last few days, you saw my artwork emerge from reference photo, to sketch, to preliminary washes, to detail. 



Below is a video that puts it together.




The "Heliconius Hecale" has multiple common names such as Hecale Longwing, Tiger Longwing, and the Golden Longwing.

It is native to the Amazon and the caterpillar eats passion-vines. The wing patterns vary widely and these butterflies have been known to mimic other butterflies that are distasteful and poisonous to birds as a protection mechanism. The name Heliconius references Mount Helicon in Greek mythology.

I used a variety of books and websites to identify the butterflies that I will be painting. One website that I found myself returning to often is a British site called Animal Photos with photographs mostly taken by Elizabeth Barrett.

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