Early summer I was playing with ideas for an illustrative MP7, the handle and rear upper back suited a fat bird with long legs; I did some research on several bird species, the first one I worked up for over two weeks before shelving as the illustration was poorly stylised and had too many hues. This time I chose a different bird of limited but pretty hues - the flamingo! (or, if you are Tony Montana ...a Pelican)

I called it ‘Lawn Enforcer’, for those that don’t know in parts of the US there is this kitsch-bygone pop culture fad of placing plastic pink flamingoes in the front lawn (similar to the garden gnome.)

Everything was going swimmingly well until during the final stages of testing I flicked on the stattrak in workbench and it obscured the birds face! I had to redraw the birds head and elongate the neck, tilting the head upward so that it cleared the side rails. As such part of the face is now overlapping a recess. There is no avoiding some disturbance to the illustration - however the stattrak now sits on the birds neck below the head rather than covering its face - a compromise I deemed acceptable (I’ve included it in the 7th slide).

Let me know feedback below!