I work from my studio in Kilcock. It is a small room with shelves all around to put my finished and unfinished work onto. I like to give each work a few days to 'rest' before I completely finalise them and email my clients their portrait scans. On this page, you will find more information on how I work together with some progress photos and videos of my process. I discuss the materials I use and how I go about completing each piece of work. Because I work from photographs, I like to share them here too for comparison. You can subscribe to the blog and receive updates 3 to 4 times a month.
I started working on this portrait this week. The work is developing from a series of photographs taken by me in the Dublin ZOO last June. They are such an inquisitive pair, very curious indeed. These penguins are Humboldt Penguins, their natural habitat being the shores of Chile and Argentina.…
I’ve finished the gorilla painting last week and here is the final result. The intense stare gives the gorilla a great expression. The painting is in acrylic on canvas, the size of canvas is 12″ x 16″ (30cm x 40cm). Up next is more card designs and another wildlife. …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
Ted’s pencil portrait is now finished. I really enjoyed the process, he seems like a very cute character. I love the way his curly fur flows in every possible direction. I tried to make the dark areas as dark as possible to differentiate between the white and black shades of his…
I’ve been working on this adorable Shih Tzu portrait in pencil for the last couple of days. His name is Ted and it is a comission from a client in Ireland. He is such a cute character and I am trying to translate this with graphite pencil on paper. The…
I was asked to produce some Christmas card designs for a new online greeting cards company called MangoSalute. The decision was to produce fine art winter landscape paintings. Both paintings are in acrylic on paper to the size of 210mm x 297mm (A4). They will be both available as part of a…
I finished Butter’s portrait today. I used graphite pencil for this, starting with a HB and finishing off with a 4B for dark areas and shadows. The background was left a little lighter to help the main subject – Butter – pop off the page. I added a horizon line…
I have progressed on the pencil drawing today finishing off Butter’s body. Progress image 3 is below. I will be adding some grass in the background, shadows on the ground and Butter’s body later on. So far I have used a HB pencil. I will be moving on to 4B…
This is a new commission from a client in Ireland. It is a pencil drawing of a very cute pug called Butter. The client tells me he is a very happy little dog and walks around proudly and determined. I’m trying to show that in his portrait. The original photograph is quite…
I added more detail to the gorilla’s face and eyes together with the background and some fur to the side. I am really enjoying this painting process. Wildlife is so precious, especially endangered species like the gorillas, such a majestic and beautiful creature. I am applying acrylic paint in thin…
The second step of gorilla wildlife painting. I applied a thin acrylic wash to create an underpainting. I wanted to be sure to mark in the shadows and highlights correctly. It has worked out quite well and I think it’s a good way of working. It is good to see…