well I looked at your gallery and it looks great to me! not a lame attempt at all!
Well the way i draw fur and hair is the most difficult. i draw almost every hair.

[link] this is an example of longer hair. the way i made it look like that is i used a mechanical pencil and drew many lines, just the way i saw them in the referance picture. i use quick fluid motions and i try not to worry about making it look perfect. after i have done a large area (eg the ear) i would use a kleenex and smudge what i just did. your lines won't be as pronounced anymore, and it seems like a huge waste of time but after you've smudged it, you've just made the underlayer of fur. then I go back and draw more lines over the smudge and it looks quite realistic when you are done.

[link] this is an example of shorter fur, in which case i used the same method as above, accept with shorter, almost jabs with the pencil instead of long fluid lines. a kneaded eraser also comes in handy for making tiny white hairs in a dark area.

anywho, i hope that was helpful!

that was VERY helpful!!! thank you so much for taking the time to write to me i'll give your technique a go over the weekend. Wish me luck!

good luck! feel free to show me the outcome!

the other thing i found out that works really well in using the gum eraser to life out some of the lighter highlights. it helped one of my portraits really pop.

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T.M.

oooh thank you so much! i will be spending next weekend testing these techniques out. Thanks again for your help