Barley...the beginning.

I received this photo for a commissioned portrait, his name is Barley.

(Is that a cute name or what?)

The owner told me he had a "butterscotch" coloring, so immediately a red flag went up, because this photo above looked like a fawn color, and butterscotch colors can go from this color to more of an orange color, so I sent the owner a quick collage as shown below.

Sure enough, the owner assured me the photo on the right was closer to the true color of her dog.  

So yesterday I began to draw Barley on a 12" X 12" canvas which is 1" thick and is gallery wrapped since the owner didn't want to get into framing it.  

Once the owner received the picture of the drawing I did, I was told that I would be praised on Facebook for the work when it's completed and given to the recipient.

I also sent this photo of a painting I did of my former dog who was a cute little miniature English Bulldog.  His name was Cody.

Today I started my underpainting of Barley.  This is done in acrylic.  It fills in the canvas nooks and crannies a bit before oils go down, serving as a compass to see the dog better.  This is NOT the final color of the background, I plan on painting it more of a sky blue, very light, powdery blue.  

I put in some color to the eyes for placement.  I also did the dog's bone a little.  

Most customers enjoy watching the process of how I create their fur baby.  It gives them greater enjoyment of the final product too knowing all the work put into it.  I've always felt one must truly love people to do human portraits and love dogs to do dog portraits, and trust me, I've had some cute dogs to do!  This one's eyes, when you see it finished will melt your heart.  I just know it.  I can look at a dog's picture and know what will be it's best feature, and also which is the best picture from which to work.  

More tomorrow!  Oh, and I don't have to have this finished and shipped by Valentine's day, so I can enjoy the process more so and do a better job...like anything else, a job done too quickly only gets done as well as you can in the time allotted.  Nice thing is the two other portraits I have to do can now be done while I'm waiting for paint layers to dry!  It all works out in the end!!!