Slow birding day

I haven't painted a bilby in a while. This is a gouache sketch of a bilby looking for some Australian birds. Things to notice:

* The tiny tiny bird on the cover of the book is an accurate representation of a species of Australian bird, who can ID it?

* Binoculars are very hard to draw.

* The bird is a Southern emu-wren. It really does have only 6 tail feathers.

There are lots of cute Australian birdies that I want to paint! P.S. My scanner decided to die after many years of service, so this is a picture taken with my camera. I had trouble trying to get it clear but color-accurate.

A>>Z

I have a file of ideas for paintings (actually, I make thumbnails or just write a phrase in one of many sketchbooks). Sometimes I start collecting references, but I have a huge backlog of these. I lost quite a few working sketches and reference photos that I had on the computer a while back when it went kaboom.

Yesterday, I decided to dip into the well and finish one picture. This concept has been floating around for 3 or 4 years now. I consider this more a sketch than a painting because I did it on cheap watercolor paper that can't take too much layering of color. But the basic idea is there. An aardvark gloats over the fact that he's the first animal in the alphabet book, and the zorilla is the last. Background looks yucky because I did it last and the paper kept sucking up the water, making the wash uneven. I do like the aardvark's feet.

Philander opposum!

Four-eyed opossums are cute. They have white eyebrows above their real eyes. Sometimes they wear ties and watches and work long days at the office.

Animals can't have glasses like people because their ears are too high, so they must all wear the little Uncle Scrooge-type nose pinchers.

Bushnewborn

Baby bushbaby with only slightly exaggerated head size.