Return Journey

Description

The Return Trip

This painting is the companion piece to Blue Tit in Flight – both captured during the same photography session on a summer day in 2025, quite possibly even the same trip to the feeder. After hours of waiting with my camera on a tripod set to fast shutter speed and burst mode, I managed to capture two usable images from hundreds of shots: the outbound journey and this return flight, triumphant sunflower seed clutched in the bird’s beak.

I didn’t notice the seed detail until I was reviewing the photos later – a tiny prize that tells the whole story of this moment. The bird feeder in our Sheffield garden is filled with sunflower hearts, so it makes perfect sense, but seeing it captured mid-flight adds a story to the painting.

The Photography Challenge

Blue tits are remarkably fast and agile, making sharp turns and rapid direction changes as they navigate between feeders and cover. Getting a clear shot of one in flight requires patience, planning, and considerable luck. The camera was positioned to capture the flight path between a nearby bush and the feeder – a distance of perhaps three or four metres that this bird travelled dozens of times throughout the session.

Most shots from burst mode end up unusable: wings at awkward angles, motion blur, the bird too far or too close, or simply out of frame entirely. These two paintings represent the successful moments from several hours of trial and error.

The Painting Process

Working in my Sheffield home studio, I created this piece in a single painting session using oils on a 6×6 inch Ampersand Gessobord panel. With the wings fully extended in this composition, the challenge of rendering all those overlapping primary and secondary flight feathers was even more demanding than the first painting.

The key is knowing when to be precise and when to stay loose. The structure of the wings needs to be convincing – you can see individual feathers and their arrangement – but keeping some of the edges soft, with some blur at the extremities helps preserve that sense of movement and energy. Too much detail and the painting becomes static; too loose and it loses credibility.

A Pair of Paintings

“Return Journey” and “Blue Tit in Flight” work beautifully as a pair, showing the complete story: the outbound flight and the successful return with food. Both paintings capture the same bird, the same summer afternoon, the same familiar garden routine that plays out dozens of times each day in British gardens across the country.

About Blue Tits

Blue tits are amongst Britain’s most beloved garden birds, bringing colour and energy to outdoor spaces year-round. These tiny acrobats – weighing just 11 grams – are fearless and curious, often the first to investigate new feeders. In Sheffield, they’re constant garden visitors, particularly fond of sunflower seeds, peanuts, and suet.

Their aerial agility is remarkable: they can hover, fly backwards, and make split-second turns that would be impossible for larger birds. Watching them work a feeder is like watching a tiny aerial display team, each bird taking its turn to dart in, grab a seed, and retreat to cover to eat.

Original Artwork Details

Specifications:

• Medium: Oil on gessobord panel
• Size: 6 × 6 inches (~ 15 × 15 cm)
• Depth: 0.3 cm (~ 1/8 inch)
• Year: 2025
• Signed on reverse
• Original: SOLD
• Companion piece to “Blue Tit in Flight”

This original oil painting has been sold, but prints are available.

Print Special Offer:
Buy prints of both Return Journey and Blue Tit in Flight together and save 5% (discount applied automatically at checkout).