oh my.....i forgot to title this!

here is the beginning of polar bears in color. i have already done this story in black & white (last year actually) AND as it's better to draw what you know..........AND due to the fact that there aren't polar bears laying around out back here (thank goodness) i need to learn the bears, which i am doing by photo's. now from what i have seen in photos, there is a vast difference between the captive bears from the wild ones... they seem to move differently, - their body shapes are different as well. their skin seems to be too larger for them a lot of the time as well.

 to my eye, the captive ones appear softer and rounder- while the wild ones appear more solidly put together. i also discovered that all of the LOOK different! which surprised me ( i don't know why i should have been surprised-that does make sense)  it was so distinctive that even bernie noticed after looking at about 40 pictures of them (i've collected over 400 of their digital images at the moment and i keep looking at them as a slide show)

so now, back to the rough study.
i lucked out on a couple of things- first i lucked out on the splattering of the mask on the paper prior to the first wash.
then even though when i tried to do the northern lights, they came out looking like a bad childrens book illustration from the 50's, when i did decide to go in and just work on studies the ironic thing was that the funky blue and the yellow fell into the right places on the bears! my eye must have noticed but i didn't. i highlighted them with white just enough to suggest moon light from above.....again my eye knew but i didn't
bernie doesn't like it as he doesn't like the colors at all......too red, yellow and blue for him
but then again if i'd done it in cold icy blues he most likely would have loved the color
he also doesn't like how i did the baby. (i only used the picture for reference.... and went and did my thing) so i have a lot of studies ahead of me now.. to learn bears as best as i can while not actually looking at the wild bears up close and personal. (hey if i was doing a book on bears AND had a mega advance....i would be going to churchill alaska and studying bears first hand so to speak)

in the budgie cage last night, the intrepid pair have found their new ladder! as well as the bottom half of their cage. (that's WHERE the new ladder is!) i was sitting here looking at bears and realized that the chirping was coming from much lower then normal. ( usually their chirping is at my ear level)- yup they were on the bottom, playing and fighting over the ladder!.... so this means a birdy play pen in the bottom and some plexi for guards from the cats

thaddeaus overnight came upstairs, he isn't feeling well but he's still eating ok, so no vet yet.
the vet and i had decided that to help him acquire a better immune system which was not efficent when he came here, we would stress him a bit here and there.......open windows all summer, and his chinese herb sinus meds while sick UNLESS he doesn't eat.....then we give him the zithromax.
so far it's working i think. he is still eating, but like everyone else i know......has a sinus thing going on
he's sneezing and can still breath so we're watching him close
that is not hard to do when he's sleeping with his head on my pillow and under my covers in my arms.....sneezing all over me
oye
cat snot
what's not to love?
we got a quilt drying outside on the line cause thaddeaus puked on it the other night and we washed it........

anyway back to my study really fast..... i am not going to document the whole thing like that duck drawing but i though you all would like to see that one
i got a ways to go yet
i still want to do egg tempera but i need to learn these bears first (i may do an egg tempera of somthing else though)
now today i have seeds to plant, and more studies of bears
dishes too
yeah like i ever get away from DISHES.....oye

ok ttyl