Pet Portraits are continuing for 2021 despite yet another National Lockdown again, which is great news for me and hopefully you as well. Do please still contact me with any enquiries you may have reagrding any portrait you may have. I may just take a little longer than usual to reply as I am juggling the dreaded homeschooling as well as commissions and just day to day life!
Mikey, dog pet portraits in pastel

First Pet Portraits of 2021 – Stanley

 

Minature schnauzer dog portraits in pastel

The very first pet portrait hot off the easel in 2021 was the beautiful Stanley.

This gorgeous boy is a birthday gift for a 50th birthday at the middle of this month. I know my clients are very sad they won’t be able tto give Stanleys portrait in person due to the lockdown restrictions , but hopefully the portrait of this beautiful boy will go someway to making up for the horrid situation we find ourselves in currently.

For his pet portrait I used pan pastels for the background and pastel pencils for Stanley himself. I love the pan pastels more and more and I have a bit of amore in depth discussion as to how I use them in this blog

Marvelous Mikey!

Mikey, dog pet portraits in pastel

What can I say about this gorgoeus chap! Not only has he the most piercing and mesmerising eyes, but he has the sweetest face. He is a beautiful boy and I have been so excited to paint him for my client. Again he is a birthday gift and I am so looking forward to hearing what the recipient thinks. Sometimes pet portraits just come together with such ease and are an absolute pleasure from beginning to end, Mikeys dog portrait was one of these. I loved my clients vision right from the choice of frame to background colour and pose of Mikey . Don’t worry though, if you aren’t sure what you went I can help guide you through the process and get you a pet portrait you will treasure forever. Mikey’s portrait measures 12.5×12.5 inches with a double off white mount with a black frame

Beautiful Bovines

Pastel portrait of three cows

This wonderful portrait has been a delight to paint from beginning to end. I do get asked for the more unusal pet portraits occasionally, towards the end of last year I was asked to paint a portrait of a gorgeous sheep called Cookie and this year I got the opportunity to paint these three. As you can see, there is also a human peaking from behind on of the cows, yes I paint people too, sometimes. I am even more particular over the photos needed to create a human face than I am an animal one. Here are some tips and advice on the sort of photograpsh I need to create your portrait if you aren’t sure

My client sent me lots of reference photos to work from and a mock up of the compostion she was thinking of for the portrait. This made settling on the final idea fairly straightforward, and with a few tweaks in photoshop the final compoistion was settled on. You can see some step by step photos of the portrait over on my facebook page. However below you can see how the final mock up looked. I am always happy to put together mock ups for you pet portraits if you are unsure.

Composition mock up for cow pet portrait