How I finally cracked thread painting water birds - steps that actually worked

I did a puffin last winter as a gift for my sister and the water part nearly broke me, so I ended up doing it a bit differently. Instead of loosening the tension I switched to a lighter weight thread for the submerged half, somthing like one strand of a thin cotton, and kept the normal tension. The stitches read thinner and cooler that way, and I layered a second pass only where the shadow under the belly sat. Took two tries to get it not looking like stripes.

The bubbles detail is so true though. I used a few French knots in pale blue instead of straight stitches and my sister thought the bird was actually in a tank when she opened it. Funny how five minutes of work does that. One thing I would add is the beak. I stitched mine in satin bands going front to back rather than long and short, and the little groove line between the yellow and orange sections has to be done in a darker orange or the whole beak turns into one flat banana. Also the eye, put a tiny white highlight stitch in after the black, before you decide you're done. Mine looked dead untill that dot went in. I worked on plain grey linen, which agreed with everything you said about busy fabric. Never again on a print.

The feet-last tip is the one I wish I'd known sooner. Mine went in mid-fill and the orange got lost against the water stitches, had to unpick and redo them sitting higher on the belly. Learned that the hard way. What do you both do with the white face patch though? Mine always reads a bit grey no matter how clean I keep it. I've tried leaving gaps between rows and it just looks patchy up close. Wondering if I should be outlining that section in something warmer before filling it, or if it's a fabric choice thing.

The white face patch got me too, on mine it went grey from the dark outline threads shadowing through. What fixed it was switching to a fine perle cotton for that section instead of the six strand stuff. The slight sheen catches the light like real feathers and it covers the ground fabric in one pass, no gaps, no patchiness. I also angled the rows out from the beak instead of running them parallel, wich stopped it reading flat. Took me three tries but the last one actually looked white.