The Riders of the Apocalypse Next entry in my Bird Omens series, we have the horsepeople (or is

The Riders of the Apocalypse

Next entry in my Bird Omens series, we have the horsepeople (or is it horsebird-people now?) of the Apocalypse: Death, Pestilence, Famine, and War. It was an extremely deliberate choice to have them all be birds of prey to counter the fact Adam & The Them are all pigeons in my Bird Omens series. There’s even small reflections of such when you view the pieces together: the crown for Pestilence is more ostentatious, Famine’s scales are tipped the other way, and the sword is on fire — but most of all, a scythe compared to an olive branch is pretty damning.

I knew out the gate I’d want Death to be a Harpy Eagle, they’re a stunning bird and the way their neck feathers actually work made for a nice pseudo-cowl for his skeletal face. Pestilence is a White Hawk, chosen for the spectacular way their wing tips look like they’ve been dunked in ink, which goes well with them as they are very goopy and spew vile things. Famine is a Black-Chested Buzzard Hawk, and of all the birds in the series he has the most unique beak — in that it’s not really a beak, just an assembly of teeth vaguely shaped like a beak; I made his face featherbald for this reason to better suit the visual. Lastly, War is our smallest but feistiest in the form of a Black Faced Hawk, complete with flaming sword; the black faced hawk has a very short tail, and this was my main reason for choosing that as her bird as it meant she could do her fancy sword tricks and not set herself on fire.

This one was a challenge to do, in a very good way, in that I pushed myself to try new things- be it with the colouring, or the fact that five years ago I had no idea how to draw wings even slightly proper and sort of just fudged them together. Death’s wings in particular were a challenge as the patterns on harpy eagles are so bold.

I also managed to kill my 110 Special Black after 12 years of service. Now its freshly refilled and even got a new chisel nib. I also killed my W0 Warm Grey working on Death. Somewhat ironic, that.

Just one to go: Shadwell & Madame Tracy, and then the entire ensemble can be put together!

(Also please enjoy the bonus photo of my cat, Cleocatra, ‘helping’ again since I saw some of y'all’s tags about her.)