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ursulav — Preening Macaws
Published: 2003-06-28 05:03:26 +0000 UTC; Views: 8527; Favourites: 339; Downloads: 1647
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I have always been a little afraid of painting feathers. There's so many. And they're scary. I mean, they're all...layered...and stuff. This is foreign to your average painting mammal.And then I took all these photos of preening macaws at the zoo, and something about their utterly stoned expressions and ruffled feathers appealed to me greatly. I wanted to paint those birds, who looked like brightly colored feather-dusters and had the hauteur of supermodels. I mean, they knew they were beautiful, and I, drab, flesh-colored average painting mammal, was just not up to their standards. And they let you know that. There is no doubt in your mind that the macaw knows it's prettier than you.
And now, many evenings later, painting feathers no longer holds much terror. Also, I can't feel my wrists. But that's okay. Every now and then I gotta do one of these just to prove I can.
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Comments: 77
The color, precision, and detail are astounding! Great work!
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Good job on the shimmery, almost irridescent color on those feathers. The detail is, of course, WOW. But I'm most unabashedly impressed with the color work. Very nice. I hate you.
Leona
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Well, from what I can see, you shouldn't have been afraid at all
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This is incredible...the detail is perfect...like a photograph! Wow...
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Holy CRAP..... Your artwork NEVER EVER ceases to amaze me!! I've drooled over it for years, literally. *clings to your legs like the drooling, obsessive fan she is* Teach me to be like you!! Just kidding.. That was corny.. Okay I go now. *begins work on a Matrix program to steal Ursula's brain..*
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Absolutely gorgeous You certainly have no trouble with feather drawing
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I'm SO passing this link to my mom (who has a Blue and Gold Macaw at home.)
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I love all your work, but the level of detail in this is spectacular. Congradualtions on you feather painting! Beautiful!!!
And this gerts a fav+ from me as well.
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Beautiful job, Ursula. You did great on those pesky li'l feathers.. I remember donating to a Christmas fund that my roommate's girlfriend/now wife took up to buy one of them for him back in college. I wonder if they still have it... They are a beautiful bird, though, but can be a bit vocal...lol. Great work...keep it up...and I'm off to continuing to follow 'Digger'...
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Holy mother of pearl in a side-car going 80. That is just... wow. No other word for it; wow. I'm not surprised that you can't feel your wrists.
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u are the supreme of the best of the greatest! what of though I'm not entirely sure or at liberty to say
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Wow! Just Wow! We need more natural talent on DA like this. Beautiful beautiful work!
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I am not cursed/blessed with macaws, but my family does have two cockatiels who are likely less trouble than macaws (while still being firmly in the 'parrot' family, I'm assuming that macaws could not possibly be too awful much worse than them). I'd rather have a dog than a bird of any sort. And I'm not much of a dog person. ;p Enough of my muttering about birds... It's four am and my goal is to go, "I know a leeetle about birds..."
I very much love the feather-work. The only thing that makes me sit and go "huh" is the "neck" feathers of the two on the left. It looks more like clumps of fur than clumps of feathers. Which isn't to say that it's not still an impressive piece, but some of the feathers seem to "cup" up rather than down and clump together more like fur would than feathers. It could just be my eyes/the compression when you resized it, I guess. The feathers elsewhere (particularly the tails of the first two and the, er.. 'butt' of the third) are gorgeous. The.. mm.. color layering? merging? shading? shifting? (I'm not sure the correct word to use here) is fantastic!
Over and all, I'm incredibly impressed with the piece and I'd like to see you (hee) perhaps revisit that one painting you did of a woman riding a giant macaw (perhaps from a different 'angle' - like a man, or a more 'acrobatic' flight or even a macaw vs macaw battle complete with riders with lances - I dunno). Mm very long comment. My only excuse is I like it and I'm tired and my brain is addlepated from spending virtually every waking moment of today reading that new Harry Potter book. I'm still assimulating.
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amazing, looks like you have no problems with feathers at all, you nailed them perfectly in this piece!
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you really did get some awsome detail in there.
something that i find unique about your photo-realism stuff, is that it captures not only detail, but personality and life. better to have a painting with minor imperfections, but with lots of character, than rigid perfection sans the character.
much excelence
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*cough* I thought this was a photo at first.
It's just that. damn. good.
I don't own a macaw. I wish I did. Meh.
Still, very, very lovely pic. It's drool-a-licious.
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Eh. Birds are more trouble than they`re worth to most people. They`re a lot more work than cats or dogs...
Insanely so...
Still. I love mine, and I`m not trading in feathers for fur ever again.
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I wish there was a 'love deviation' for this picture.. because I definitely love this!! Parrots are spectacular birds. I own a Green-Cheeked Conure and a very loud Jenday myself. Well.. it's more like Rayfan said.. they own me really. Heh ^_^
The texture on the feathers is wonderful, truly vibrant and very three-dimensional.. can see the layers of the feathers quite clearly.. look so ruffled up with all the preening that's going on. You have efficiently created a gloss on all those feathers too... looks great! ^_^ Truly a wonderful trio of troublemakers! +Fav!!
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As the servant (don't dare say "owner") of a macaw, I can vouch for the fact that you got their personality correct - except that they also let you know they are in fact the center of the universe. Beautiful work! The poses and movements are captured perfectly, as well as the feathers, eyes, facial expressions... the combination of beauty and clownishness of a big macaw.
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oh wow, thats amazing. The colors, and the detail in the feathers is amazing. They look so lifelike, with your own little touch of style in them. This is really great, nice job here!
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