German Shepherd Portrait

My latest portrait commission is Gaby, a lovely German Shepherd. This portrait is mixed media (India ink, watercolor & color pencil) on textured Claybord (now known as Aquabord). Claybord is a masonite board coated with an absorbent/scratchable surface, it has a rough texture that reacts similarly to watercolor paper. The advantage is that paint can be lifted off easily and thesurface can be scratched to add fur texture. Manufactured by Ampersand, it's a great surface for my mixed media portraits. I use it when my client wants a realistic color portrait - as opposed to a realistic grey toned portrait (which I would do in pencil on paper or ink on scratchboard). You can find Claybord/Aquabord at Blick Art Materials (type "aquabord" in the search box, note that it's "bord" not "board").

I scanned the portrait along the way to illustrate my progress.


Color reference photo of Gaby.


I've drawn in the darkest darks with India ink in a Rapidograph pen.


Here I've added watercolor to block in the basic colors.
Next, I scratched most of the portrait with a #16 X-acto knife. Unfortunately, I had a bit of a brain fade and forgot to scan it after that step! The portrait was much lighter at that point and the colors were better blended together than in the above image.


The last steps were to add watercolor over the scratched areas, and a bit of India ink in some of the darkest areas. Then I went over the top with color pencil to add the final details and blend some of the shades.

I also put together a video with a time-lapse of the portrait.

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"HamLlama" Wacky ACEO Art

Every so often in the eBay art world, a "fad" takes hold. There are some subjects that always seem to be popular (cats for one) but these fads spike and then disappear for the most part. It's really obvious in the ACEO (small format, 3.5" x 2.5" art) realm - I think because generally these smaller gems are affordable. Although, when these fads hit hard, some of the ACEOs go for outrageous prices - something all ACEO artists dream about!

Since I've been selling ACEOs on eBay, I've seen a run on mermaid art, musk ox art and raven art. The mermaid fad is still going pretty strong. The musk ox fad happened when one particular buyer mentioned that he'd be interested in musk ox art - so of course, many of us jumped on that bandwagon and came up with musk ox art. This buyer snatched up most of what we created. Gotta jump on those sales opportunities when they present themselves!! The raven fad is still pretty steady too, but it really spiked when a couple of buyers got into bidding wars over raven ACEOs. When eBay artists see that kind of activity, they give everyone in their art groups a heads up and those of us who feel like participating feed the fire. I've done only one mermaid ACEO, because mermaids just aren't my thing, but I had to try one. It was goofy, a bit snarky and, no big surprise, it hasn't sold! When it comes to animals though, I'm pretty much game for anything. So I drew three musk oxen (2 sold to that one buyer, the other one, a scientific style illustration of a skull is in my Etsy shop), and 2 ravens (both sold) - you can search this blog for "raven" to see them.

Well, now, the "thing" seems to be hamsters. So here's my first hamster ACEO - "HamLlama":



Obviously, it's not all hamster, but it was fun to draw. I got the idea from one of the ACEO art group members - I had mentioned that I realized resistance was futile and it was time for me to jump on the hamster bandwagon. This artist had seen my "Llemon-Llime Llama" painting and suggested (partly in jest) a hamster llama combo. Well in my quirky little mind, that seemed like a really good idea and you see the result. I am pleased with it - it's silly and odd! I used Prismacolor color pencils in bright colors, including orange, canary yellow, neon green and neon red. Click on the HamLlama to see the eBay listing.

Are there more hamster ACEOs on the horizon for me? Perhaps, but they'll be a bit more realistic, I suspect.

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"Happy Guy" Pit Bull Terrier Mini Drawing

My first new ACEO for May, a happy, smilin' American Pit Bull Terrier. This pencil drawing is now available on eBay, click on the image to see the listing.

For reference, I used a wonderful photo provided by the director of Pit Prints Rescue. She e-mailed a bunch of great photos, so you'll be seeing more pittie art from me. I'm donating 15% of the final sale price of this piece to Pit Prints.


ACEO format: 2.5" x 3.5"
Graphite pencil

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Chevy - Latest Portrait Commission

I just delivered this portrait of Chevy the golden retriever yesterday. I did it in ink on scratchboard (Paris brand, white) and it's 8" x 10". I scanned it a few times during the process to try to show how I work on this type of portrait. There's a lot of detail on this portrait, unfortunately, it won't show all that well here, but I think you'll get the idea.

I took many, many photos of Chevy and then chose 4 or 5 of my favorites and e-mailed those to Chevy's owners. They chose their favorite photo from that set and I sized and cropped it as shown below. I also created a greyscale version for tonal reference.



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This image shows "phase one" or the inking phase. I've already transferred the image to the scratchboard (using transfer paper) - being careful to block in the pertinent details and tonal areas. I look for my darkest darks, mediums and lightest lights. I use a rapidograph pen with India ink to put in the areas that I want black - parts of the eyes, nose, & mouth. I'll also do some stippling (dot pattern in some of the really dark, but not solid black areas). Then, in a plastic palette, I mix 3 shades of India ink wash (India ink and water): dark, medium and light. I use a paintbrush to lay in those areas. This gives me a "road map" for the next stages of the drawing. I think of this process as refining and defining the road map as I go along.

The ink wash is pretty streaky, but that's ok, I'll soften all that up with the next step: scratching with an X-acto knife. The image below is a close up of the image above.


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Here I've gone over the whole portrait with a #16 X-acto knife. The #16 has a more angled tip than the standard #10 - less likely to gouge the surface. Hmmm, maybe it's a "less angled" tip, well, it's sharp but not quite as "pointy" as the #10 - that's what I'm getting at. I don't scratch in every single hair, but I do define the fur texture and direction at this stage. Scratching also softens the transitions between tones. The fur ends up a lot lighter and I think you can see how the effect is softer than the image above this one. Having darks or mediums "under" the lights is critical - that's how I define the layers and depth. There has to be a darker tone to scratch into in order to show a wisp of hair.



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Now I've gone back over the portrait and re-inked it, again using washes of India ink (dark, medium, light and very light). The cool thing is that now this new layer of ink fills in the scratches made previously and adds another layer of texture and tone.


It's still a bit streaky, but better blended than when I put that first layer of ink down on the unscratched surface. You can also see the detail starting to show up - especially in his ear and mouth.

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In the final stages, I scratch to soften the transitions and blend areas together and add ink where needed to pull the whole thing together. This also where I define those last little bits, like the extension of his eyelashes, whiskers/hairs around his mouth and tidy up the highlight in the eye. I'll also use a bit of graphite pencil to define the tips of the hairs and fill in small areas - just a line here and a line there. Here's a close up of the final portrait.

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