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TwilightSaint — The Ursa Dragon
Published: 2011-03-08 21:04:49 +0000 UTC; Views: 4996; Favourites: 153; Downloads: 0
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Two dragons in one day? :0 This is compensation!!!
Second dragon in the '2011 Planetary Dragon Series,' the Ursa dragon(s)!
Ursa meaning bear, and in reference to the Big and Little Dippers or Big and Little Bears of the night sky. These constellations usually shortly follow Orion in the night sky, coming up over the hemisphere, and, in my case, rising over the Appalachian Mountains.
Mythologically speaking, they're called the bears as the 'Big' one is the mother bear watching her 'Little' bear a short distance away. However, someone with no imagination at all quipped how the brightest stars of the back and bodies of the bears resembled a spoon or dipper, thus resulting in the common name of the 'Dippers.' There are stars surrounding the 'spoons' that make up the arms and legs of the 'bears,' but they are fainter and harder to make out in well-lit areas.
These guys are also hailed by navigators as the compass of the sky. By lining up the two front stars of the front of the 'spoon,' one can trace a short line up to the tail end of the Little Dipper, thus finding Polaris, the North Star. Walking towards this star always leads you north. (Very handy if you're lost or just need to find the direction of the Qibla. X) )
I really like the colours in these guys, and the perspective in general, (lol, bear-dragon butt. X) ) And I think it's adorable how the Little dragon is reaching out to his mommy! 
~~~
Hee-hee-hee.
So I figured it's time to start...
The Planetary Dragon Series 2011!!!!!!
I think a lot of people probably agree with me. *bites tongue*
But yeah, kicking it off. ^^
And starting with the Quiper Belt dragon! 
Similar to the Asteroid Belt, the Quiper Belt is a rocky ring made of chunks of rock and ice. It exists beyond Pluto by a few thousand miles or so, and it is one of the reasons why Pluto isn't considered a legitimate planet anymore, (which I myself am protesting.) Pluto is now considered a rather large, with a moon, orbiting body within the Quiper Belt, along with some neighbors that have been discovered in the past few years by high-res telescopes.
Chunks of rock and ice? Sounds kinda' like, oh, I dunno, comets? That's because most of the comets in our Solar System come from the Quiper Belt. o3o Fancy~~~ Can comets be considered orbiting bodies? Well...yes and no, depending on how long they live, but we here on Earth encounter them occassionally, like Hale-Bopp, and, most famously, Haley.
Ice in the Quiper Belt? Ice as in water? Probably not. As the ice on the bodies in the Quiper Belt exist in extreme conditions from being such a helluva long drive from the Sun, other elements exist in this petrified, frozen state, similar to Jupiter's moons like Titan. The bodies are so cold that anything that we know would immediately become frozen solid. We're not talking F or C, we're talking freaking K.
The first series gallery folder: twilightsaint.deviantart.com/g…
The second series folder: twilightsaint.deviantart.com/g…
This series folder: twilightsaint.deviantart.com/g…
Enjoy!!!
Art/series (c) me.
~~~
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Comments: 51
I think it was not only a lack of imagination that resulted in the Dippers being named after kitchenware, but also a large amount of sheer lazyness to not use said lack of imagination. I, for one, would enjoy imagine a bear...or a dragon...in the stars.
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Lol, yeah! XD Or people just have bad eyesight and can't actually see the 'arms' and 'legs' that are actually parts of the constellations. XD
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*cough* the uh...dippers in question are saddles upon the backs of bears.
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Ahhhh...now I feel dumb...
I guess that's what happens when you don't get astronomy in school. (I moved every freaking time I was going to do astronomy, it's a miracle I know what the planets are. It's Venus, then Earth, right? 
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ohhhh dear....
look it up. There are few things more intensely exciting than astronomy once you get into it. Even just barely dabbling a toe in, as I do, is interesting enough.
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Look it up, I definitely shall. Thanks!
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Aw! That's so cute! the little bear is so tiny! lol Love it!
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So cute!
To be honest, I could never, and still can't, see the bears in Ursa Major and Ursa Minor. :/
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Thank you!
Yeah, the stars that make up their legs are pretty faint, and then blend in with the rest of the sea of stars behind them sometimes, lol.
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Holy....cow.....awesome.
Sorry for the non excited comment, I'm in pain and I'm tired. I'll make a excited comment when I'm a little more awake. But still, it's bloody awesome.
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Actually, the big and little dippers didn't come from someones random ruminations on a dark night, they came from the era when slavery was rampant among the states, and escaped slaves needed to find their way as they traveled during the night, and slept during the day. I'm sure you've heard of the song "Follow the drinking Gourd". Slaves needed something easily recognizable, and because they couldn't see the bear at night, they then used the two dippers to navigate, much like the sailors did.
On topic then, very cool image, I like how you actually describe whats in it instead of saying "Heres some art, give me favs because of my superior awesomeness..."
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Really? Aw, man, I've never heard of that! (The story nor the song - I'll have to look it up.) That's pretty sweet.
And thanks!
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Very beautiful~ I love the colors in this picture and it looks so amazing as well~
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