1000 Ducks

“Everyone who knew Pat said he was their best friend. It wasn’t just that he was the funniest person you’d ever meet; his heart radiated a warmth that could enclose you. His smile was constant and captivating, his laugh inviting and honest. Loving him was just very easy. It still is.

When he got sick he got really sick. The treatments made him sicker. That’s how it goes–as too many of us know. You have to put your trust and hope into something that requires so much endurance from the person in the center of it–and it’s all so real. It’s very big, the reliefs are small, and the stakes make an escape terrifyingly binary.

He got into bird-watching too–for good reasons. To be engaged in it well, to let it enrich you, runs contrary to the ways we try to meet our day-to-day expectations and obligations: you must exercise patience, silence, and non-interference. You have to actively use your senses to better engage your passivity and cloak your excitement. And what you come back with is just the knowledge that you saw something.

Ducks are the perfect bird to watch–especially when you need to take advantage of whatever recovery offers you: they are easy to find in the city (on land, sea, and air), they are easy to study (being close and generally slow moving), they come in a wide variety (of colors and sizes), their behaviour is endearing and their attitude is tolerant.

Ducks are as easy to ignore as they are easy to enjoy. The rewards are hidden in plain sight, almost contrary to how simple an activity it is to do. I encourage you to try it; don’t wait until it’s all you can bear. If you can sit–and watch–then you’re already practically an expert.

You might like to know there are about 25 species of duck found in Greater Vancouver. I decided to make Pat a Visual Guide to the Ducks of Vancouver and as a joke I decided to insert one imaginary kind of duck. Something he would know is just for him. That joke became this book.”

Here are a few details about how the ducks were made.

Because these drawings started with a guide to actual, real life local duck species the base shapes came from those living ducks. However each Duck in the project has its own silhouette. The only repeat feature that’s identical across all of them is the shape and size of their eyes.

There are no repeat words in the duck names–besides the word “duck”.

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100 Duck Calls is an accompanying album for the single book. It features “natural recordings” of 100 ducks in 2 environments: seashore and pond side. Both the sounds of the birds and the surrounding sounds were digitally created. There are no actual birds.

The environments are collages of various locations and the duck sounds were made by either creating the sounds from digital modular synths or by manipulating samples of other things (people, objects, instruments, etc.) in another set of synthesizers.

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There are currently some full-size decoys available and a new line of 3D printed and hand finished sculptures are currently in the works. Any full-size decoys that exist, and are available, will be on my YupShop.