I just love red pandas. They’re like a mix of cat and bears, and they look really friendly adn cuddly. I never been lucky enough to spot one though, despite having been to zoos that have them. Sadly, every time I’ve been to these zoos the red pandas have either been hiding in their dens, or high up in trees.
These are of course not the natural colours of a red panda, but I just wanted to try out a different colour palette, which I have since used in plenty of other images. This paired really well with my digital watercolour experiment, where I’m just trying to see how adding watercolour textures and light washes would look. I’m overall quite pleased with how this image came out, but most of all I’m loving the adorable pose.
When thinking of a typical red panda pose then I always think of a red panda draped over a branch just like this. I cannot speak for how comfortable it really is, but they sure seem to have a lovely and relaxing time while handing out like in this position.
This was painted as part of my limited colour palette challenge, Huely, in 2020, which also includes a Red Cardinal and a Toucan. They don’t only share the exact same colour palette, but as they are all known for sitting in trees, it made sense to give them a similar setting and background, despite living in different areas of the world.