A quick Eagle Owl that I di as part of a bigger project. Somehow it feels like it is irritated at me. All I did was to create him :D.
Blender 2.8 and all material procedural.
Small feathers hair directly on body and bigger feathers curves converted to mesh with hair particles that then was used as particles on the owl body.
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Nice job mate. You really nailed the look of variety in the feathers and the expression gained from just exagerated eye brows is brilliant. I’m surprised the poly count isnt higher. Well done.
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Thanks.
I have the ref. images to thank when it comes to the eyebrows. I just made them a little more like hair ;).
The shape of the owl is more or less just a deformed default cube… with a beak, so it doesn’t have to be many polys.
The reason I increased the poly count (applied some subdivisions) was mostly to get a detail control on the weight paint. Then since it already was high, I thought it was easier to just continue sculpting a beak and some forms for the wings, then model those parts.
The eyes is of course also important to make it look alive, but it took a while to find the color tone to make that happen. It was only by accident I found out that there should be a darker tone of brown close to center, so not just yellow/orange. When that third color come in place the Owl instantly got that sharp and irritated look. It’s fantastic what those small things can do :).
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How long did that take to render? Great work, btw.
Another question, are all those feathers done with hair simulation and shaders? Great quality. 
Thank you :)!
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The rendertime is not long. Like 10 minutes, but it is using denoiser (you can see it in the background unfortunately).
Yes, mostly hair particles… or hair particles placed on a curve… and then used as particles.
Material on them is just prucedural textures, so no images involved in the shaders.
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wow, just…WOW!!! By the way, the owl always reminded me of a cat with wings, lol
I haven’t seen your reference image, of course, but this little guy does seem to be wearing a puffy feather collar. Yeah, and he looks a little bit grumpy. But the detail is terrific.
Love it! Just love it!
Lovely! Will we see some animation? I think you can improve the brows? They are more like extra feathers. Yours look like it is growing hairs, unless I am mistaking it for another species. This is what I mean:
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This is incredible, congratulations really! Generally you can find tutorials on how to make fur or fur coated animals online but I saw way less projects involving feathers. Thanks a lot for contributing with this stunning piece! (and the fact that everything is procedural is just woah)
Can you post any pictures of your node setup? I’m trying to create a similar effect but I’m not sure where to start on the feather materials.
Gorgeous work well done!
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I featured you on BlenderNation, have a great week 
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