Originally Posted by mrsD
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The Cornell folks now have an app for bird identification, for tablets and smart phones: and they are free.


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I have used this iPhone app 3 times now.

They have one for Android now too.

Many people believe being an artist requires talent. This is just not true completely.
This famous artist explains quickly and humbly:

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The Field museum is a huge natural history museum in Chicago.
Allow yourself a whole day if you ever get a chance to visit it.
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Check out Peggy's website.... it is awesome!

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This site is a bit confusing, but very very impressive once you
get the hang of it!

Anyone can learn the skills for drawing. Betty Edwards has books to teach anyone to draw. One is "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain". It takes patience, learning how to actually SEE and practice--a lot of practice. Wanting to draw and paint, does take desire, however.

The right brain does most of the work, and learning how to turn off the critical left brain takes some practice. But once you learn how to let your right brain "free"...there are many benefits besides the art work. I find that it helps relax you, and can even help with pain control. For me "talent" is about 10% and persistence and patience is 90%. Right now I am taking screen shots as references from Safari Live from S. Africa! This is a fabulous learning tool and aid for artists as well: on youtube, Nat Geo wild TV every Sunday, and Facebook etc.

I have done one drawing so far from Safari Live:
#1 is the screenshot
#2 is my pencil drawing