Welcome to my on the easel blog. Here you are able to view the progress of each pet and family portrait I complete in Oils, Pastel and Pencil. Clients are encouraged to comment on their portrait at any time. Feedback is always welcome!
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Nick and I have a few websites between us and you can visit them by clicking the links below.
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These are the next portraits in my client list. They are in order and as I paint and draw each picture you will see the progress step by step each day here on my blog. I am working to around about a 14 week timetable and I offer gift vouchers for those who would like a portrait for a short deadline.
This is one of my latest portraits that has been framed by Mike our framer and we love the outcome. The frame is really unsual and it was a special request by the client and we hope to add it to our range very soon. This portrait is being sent off to the client tomorrow for a birthday next month. We hope that they have a wonderful surprise.
Melanie has been very industrious this weekend while my parents were here and has created a video introduction for our website. Its great for clients who haven’t visited out site before as it not only welcomes them to our site but also gives a quick tour of the main areas of the site too. You can view it on our home page here – pet-portraitartist.com
This is my latest horse portrait. It is a small 12 x 10 pencil drawing on fabriano paper. The horse is a friesian mare, I am receiving some great horse commissions at the moment.
Here is a pastel pet portrait I completed before Christmas. The client has kindly emailed me this photo of the portrait framed on her wall. I always love to see my artwork in its new home. It’s still hard to believe that paintings I do in our little cottage in rural Wales, end up in homes all around the world. This little westie is in North Carolina.
The little gold plaque below the artwork contains this quote,
Rudolph Valentino
1992 – 2008
Born a dog, died a gentleman
Better late than never! Here is a pencil drawing I completed a couple of months ago. I completely forgot to blog it. I’m glad to say the family were delighted with the portrait, they said
” every friend that comes round is stopped in their tracks when they see the portrait, its just so striking”.
These are the final images of the pastel on velour pet portrait. The portrait has been hand drawn at 20 x 16 and its currently on its way to the framer to be framed. I will hopefully be adding a photo of it framed here this week. I am really pleased with how this one worked out. The photo reference of the dog wasn’t the best, it was a mobile phone snap with the wall of a dog kennel behind. So hopefully I have made the most out of it and given spot a nice environment to sit in, he actually lives on a Welsh hill farm. I used multiple photos as reference for the background scenery and had to change the direction of light when drawing, to match the light on spot the jack russell. This alowed me to be really creative and expressive with the pastel sticks. I am getting to do a lot more of these scenic portraits lately and I’m loving it!
This is the next stage to the Jack Russell pet portrait in pastel on velour I am working on. I am going back into the dogs face with detail and on the chest too. I will add another photo when I am doing the grass at the base of the dogs feet and then I will be working into the background.
This is my latest pet portrait of a Jack Russell in a Welsh landscape. This commission is from our vet who is currently treating Amram our cat (who seems to be doing well at the moment). She has commissioned this as a birthday gift in just over a weeks time and our local craftsman framer is going to frame it for us too.
The photo of the dog was taken in front of a kennel and the client wanted some kind of background, perhaps a landscape, so we found some lovely photos of local landscapes which we felt fitted well.
I think the dog looks as though it is sitting well within the scene and I don’t think you woudl know at this stage that the dog wasn’t originally photographed there. The key is to try to marry the background colours within the dog itself, adding reflective highlights in the correct places. It helped that the photo of the dog was taken outside in natural light. Its more difficult to place a dog and a scene together if the dog has been photographed indoors with a flash.
Here are the final images of the cat pet portraits in pastel I have been working on recently. This portrait is hand drawn onto Hahnemuhle Velour Pastel Paper to the size of 20 x 16. This was commissioned by a UK client to give as a Birthday gift. Each cat has its own individual personality and character and I enjoyed capturing each one with its individual colouring, markings and expressions.
I am about to start a portrait of a Jack Russell in a welsh landscape next, you can view the reference photo on the right. The dogs photo was taken in front of a kennel so we found a suitable photo to use as a backdrop and I think it works well. I will add the first stage soon.
This is the next stage of the cat pet portrait in pastel. I have been mainly working on the black and white cat today. It has been lovely working in the studio its raining outside as so we have the wood burner going so its cosy. I have also painted the edges fo the horses and created one amendment for the client so all I need to do now is sign them and they are nearly ready to pack and send.
I have now finished for the day, its 6pm and i hope you all enjoy your Saturday evening!