A girl and her pencils..... Grey Owl part 2

Hello. Happy Friday! It's kind of odd chatting away here and wondering whether anyone anywhere in the world will find this post! But I said I was going to share my journey, so here goes.....
This lovely owl is proving to be far more time consuming than even I imagined, and I imagined a very long time. I am spending as long - or probably longer - straining over the reference photo trying to pick out detail, as I am actually drawing. This is the problem with working a lot larger than the photo, and why really, if you do, you need a super high resolution photo. As I blow the detail in the photo up it becomes blurry and trying to tell which way the feathers are going is seriously hard. But it matters. Feathers going the wrong way look terrible. I began working on the beak for a little respite. I shouldn't have done really, because see how many more feathered areas there are! And there will be no respite! I have done a little extra work on the eyes too, but that will be ongoing. You see, that's the thing with colored pencils, you can just add and add and add. It feels like each little mark is insignificant, but each little mark is important. Sometimes a few tiny strokes make a huge difference. And the more you keep adding the more the piece comes to life. Which is very exciting! And that is one of the joys of working in coloured pencils.