Watch a time-compressed video showing me painting a portrait of Tally, a beautiful Golden Retriever. Time: 3 and a half minutes.
Charming Chuy
This is smilin’ Chuy. Like most little dogs, he makes up for a lack of physical stature by means of a massive personality. I love this portrait! Let me tell you why. First off, you can’t look at Smilin’ Chuy without smiling back. I think I captured his happy nature with this portrait. Secondly, in terms of technique, I love the sense of depth I created by carefully placing dark areas next to lighter areas. …
Hobee
It’s been a while since I posted a portrait (or anything else). I’ve got quite the backlog of portraits to show. Let’s start with one of my favorites. This is Hobee. Not much to say about this happy fella, except that I really like the way the bright blue background sets off the orangey tone of his head. I added some electric orange tones on his cheeks that create a nice glowing effect, making the …
Thinking of Boris
My yearly tribute to Boris, our big black Mastador who passed in 2019, this time featuring a new graphite portrait of the big guy.
New Drawings
In which I present two new drawings along with self-critique and one previous drawing with a far better scan.
Dreamer & Izzy
It’s been a long time since I’ve posted anything, let alone a pet portrait. To be honest, after Christmas portrait orders fell off a cliff and haven’t bounced back yet. I think the economy is forcing people to cut back on the frills. At any rate, here is one of my absolute favorite Christmas portraits from last year. This is Dreamer and Izzy. The owner sent me a bunch of very good photos to use …
Returning to My First Love
About fifteen years ago, a local estate sale organizer tipped my wife off about a couple estate sales, strongly urging that I attend. My wife was one of her regular customers, and somehow she knew I was an artist. So I went, and scored a huge supply of oil paints, canvas, brushes, palettes, paper stock, and even a large flat file on rollers. The flat file was an especially large wooden monster with 12 drawers …
Watercolor Failures
I’ve been failing at watercolor on nearly a daily basis, and I couldn’t be happier.