One day my Prints will come...

I've been so impatient over the past few days! Last week I ordered some proofs from a printing company I found. There was an attempted delivery on Tuesday, then Wednesday and I finally managed to get them today, and I am so pleased :) I've decided to offer limited edition giclée prints of my originals, I will make a page on my website all about them but I wanted to share some info on them now. Also, from now on commissions will be able to have extra prints made alongside the original, so if clients wish to have copies for friends or family this can be accomodated.

The printers are an accredited fine art printer, with a valid UKAS certificate, and are a member of the Fine Arts Trade Guild which ensures the prints are of the highest quality.

Pastel paintings (example above) will be printed on Hahnemuhle Torchon 285gsm acid free paper, Oil paintings can be on either this paper or Hahnemuhle Leonardo Canvas and pencil portraits will be available on Somerset Enhanced Velvet fine art paper. Also each will have it's own certificate of authenticity. The website will be updated with more info this weekend.

Bernese Mountain Dog - Finished, and a free portrait competition!

Well, it's been a while since I updated last, I won't make any excuses, I just decided to have a little down time, I went back and did some of my Pet Portrait Diploma exercises, had some guests stay and just had a little relax.

Last night I went back and finished off the Bernese picture which has been waiting for a while to be completed. I think he looks beautiful in that full fur coat!

Now for the competition, I'm running a little incentive for people to become fans of mine on Facebook. I'm asking friends there (and others on my website and blog) to recommend people to "Like" my page! Once I get to 150 fans, everyone will be entered into a draw to win a free 12x16 graphite portrait of any pet or person they wish! Everyone likes something for free, so come along and join me on Facebook! Simply click on Facebook on this page or at the side and you'll be taken straight there :)

Lion - Finished!

As I hoped I would, I managed to get the Lion finished yesterday. I took a break in the afternoon and went back for half an hour in the evening to finish off the details. So here he is, Unison pastels on Pastelmat, 50x70cm, and I'm toying with the idea of the name "Pride" suggested to me by a friend.

Lion WIP

Another quickie post today, I'm hoping to have this guy finished today at somepoint so want to spend as much time as I can away from the PC and at the drawing board. More of the lion done, will block the rest of the mane in then go back and pick out more details on the face.

Rhina Finished

I have just this second finished the portrait of Rhina, just in time it seems as Zac has come to pester me for a walk! Hoping to get her approved today then she will be off to the framers to receive a double mount ready for framing. She will also go up on the website today if I can remember how!

Lion WIP

Another quick post today! I'm busy in the kitchen tonight mastering another art, the art of Sushi! Not completely traditional as I couldn't get any fish quite fresh enough for preparing it raw, and mine will be vegetarian, but it's a fun and complicated dish to prepare! In the meantime, I have done some more work on my lion. Working from the left to the right so as not to smudge as per usual. I've also selected my next few reference pictures for the Pet Portrait Diploma exercises and will beginning work on them as soon as I can, which may mean the original art is on a back burner for a while.

Rhina - GSD in graphite

A quick post this morning as I wanted to keep the blog updated with all my work, but didn't want to inundate single posts with many different artworks. So here is Rhina, a female GSD commission that I started last night, and hope to get finished within the next couple of hours or so. For some reason, the quality of the scan isn't great but I'll make sure to improve it when scanning the final image. I've also changed her nose position slightly so it's a bit unsightly at the moment!Waiting to have our fridge repaired today and as usual the repairman couldn't give me an exact time, so I'll be in the house all day most likely with plenty of time for work.

Lions and Damsons and Jams, oh my!

As this, somewhat whimsical post title suggests, my time of late has been taken over completely by the afforementioned items. Damsons, as I've mentioned before, have become the bane of my existence, littering the garden, getting trodden on and trampled into the house and matted into Zac's fur. The fight back begun last week with copious amounts of jam and chutney making! Our cupboards are now full enough of damson preserve to last us at least a year, with more of the little devils still to be picked from the tree. My next plans are for Damson Gin and Vodka, which can be nice Christmas gifts and also will be great for my own personal use (in moderation of course!)


Onto the Lion: I decided to paint another large pastel piece in order to take to the gallery, and I found a picture of a male lion looking skywards in the free section on a stock photo site and thought it was a beautiful pose. So here he is, I'm toying with the title "Contemplation" but I am terribly indecisive so it may change several times before he is actually finished.

A little bit of painting after a holiday

I've been away from the drawing board and easel for the past two weeks, I've had a bit of a "holiday" consisting of staying at home and not doing very much but we also had my dad and stepmum visit for the first time since we moved to England in 2008, and we had a nice few days of exploring Leamington, Stratford and going to the Twenty20 cricket final in Birmingham. Anyway, I have started working again now, despite being drowned in damsons:



More on that later! But I have begun my very first oil painting. It's a bit tricky, but I'm enjoying oils so much more than acrylic! Here is one of the first stages of the painting, just blocking in colours and tones, will wait for him to dry and do some more work in the next couple of days. I also have the Bernese to continue with in the meantime and I'm planning to start another big pastel original so watch this space.

Bernese Mountain Dog

Just a quick update tonight, I had meant to blog about this piece on Sunday but got distracted by cooking, cleaning, all the fun things that need doing on a Sunday afternoon! I was also busy monitoring the progress of the baby pigeons who had hatched months ago in one of the trees in our garden, of which I have some pictures that I will share as soon as I have more time. I also started another original wildlife pastel painting today, most of the background has gone in so I will post the first stages soon, hopefully tomorrow :) In the meantime, here is the second scan of my Bernese Mountain Dog portrait that I am working on in graphite. I like to try and work left to right so as not to smudge anything and tomorrow I will be working on the left part of his face and left ear, so he should look much better once that is done as right now he's looking a little odd!

Decisions and a Finished Portrait

After picking up my pencils again for Zac's portrait it seems I have got the ball rolling where graphite is concerned. Shortly after finishing Zac I began working on this little Pekingese called Peekee. I also managed to finished in a relatively short time so tomorrow he'll be taken to the framers along with Zac to be mounted and then will be posted off to his new home. The reference photo wasn't great but I am pleased by the likeness and also so are his owners!

Now the "decision" part of this post is regarding my inability to decide what original art I should be working on next. A few months ago I was approached by the manager of a local gallery who had seen one of my flyers and was interested in my work. He suggested that I bring in a small portfolio of originals to him and his boss and they could either sign me up to produce work for them or to help me find work for others, which was an extremely exciting prospect! I have the first original complete, my tiger pastel "In For A Kill" and now as always I'm struggling to think of what to do next.


So in the meantime I took up another graphite drawing, this time just for myself, of a lovely Bernese Mountain Dog the reference to which is on the Pet Portrait Forums. I haven't scanned the first stages yet but will be sure to do so tomorrow, and hopefully I may have come to the decision of what original I'll do next.

Zac Completed

Wow, it's hot hot hot in Leamington today! I've managed to get some work done in the garden and also some housework done which I have been ignoring, but most importantly Zac's portrait is completed! It now means I can update my website banner and also to create some vouchers with Zac as my main example of my work. I'm also going to send a print to Zac's puppy walker and her granddaughter who still adore him and also my neighbour who fostered him before we rehomed him. I haven't used graphite for some time and it's great to notice that I think I have actually improved with the small break! Next to come is a large acrylic painting which I hope to get started in the next few days.

Zac continued

Just a quick update tonight as I want to be able to go finish this picture soon. He's going to be the new face on some of my advertisements and also on my vouchers which I want to start working on straight away. It's importrant not to rush but I'm getting so close to finishing it's tempting to "speed up" a little. I should definitely finish him tomorrow, I have big plans for sorting out our spare bedroom and giving my studio a little spruce up on Saturday and I'd like to be able to work on the aforementioned graphic design work in the evening.

Zac Pencil Portrait

Oh dear, again it seems I've neglected my little blog. When I set up my website my other half added a feature to blog, however I found it difficult to edit and I thought a blogger site would be much easier and therefore would mean I could update much more. I really have no excuse so I won't make any and will continue on with posting again.

I did eventually finish my horse portrait and will post the result soon. Here is the first stage of a portrait in graphite pencil of my dog Zac. I think it shows a lot of progress from my very first graphite portrait!



Today has been a hectic day, a visit to the dentist then meeting up with my other half for lunch, home and then housework for the rest of the afternoon, so I took some time out to do this just for me. I'm also intending on taking Zac back to Guide Dogs today for a visit to let them know how he is getting on almost a year since we adopted him.

Fenix Song

I really do need to keep this blog updated more!

I have a finished piece of work to show today, here is "Fenix Song" 18x20 inches, acrylic on canvas. I have been busy pottering about in the garden and generally tidying up the house and updating some things on my website, hopefully I'll have more time to work on some originals in the next couple of months.

Logan

While I'm here I thought I should maybe post some of the commissions I've completed lately, here is Logan, my cousin's black labrador who was my very first pet portrait! Here he is as an adorable puppy in graphite:

And here he is again as an adult, as a Christmas gift from my cousin to his wife, which I had framed and posted up to him, just in the nick of time as well if I remember correctly!

"Fenix Song" WIP

Here is a WIP of "Fenix Song" I've been working on for a couple of weeks in acrylics. I decided I wanted to do an original horse painting, I chose the reference from my backlog of photos I've collected and began sketching it on the day of the Newbury races where two horses were killed by electrocution. I've always had problems naming originals so I decided to call this "Fenix Song" parts of the name from both of the horses who died that day, just as my own little remembrance. I've been off and on at this as I had two commissions to finish before the end of February but I've managed to get a fair bit done today although it's still very much in it's early stages.

I haven't done much with the background as of yet, I think I will continue on the horse and see what will suit him afterwards! I'm hoping to get to Warwick races in the next couple of weeks to take some reference photos for inspiration, plus it's always a nice excuse for a day out.

Testing!

I've just linked my neglected blog to my Facebook fan page, hopefully this will help me keep both this blog and facebook updated more regularly! And here is the WIP of my first digital portrait, hoping to finish this week!