*See updated picture uploaded of lightened background.
This one is not a commission. I chose this dog because it is popular in my neck of the woods. I chose this photo to work off of because I thought it would be challenging to do the sunlit highlights (and the doggy is so cute :) OMG was it challenging! I did a little different background since he seemed like he should be outside LOL. I could probably do more tweaking to it but since it is not for hire.....good enough as it is. about 11 hours total.
This is a fantastic dog painting. I would suggest about reducing saturation of background as it takes all attention from the dog due to bright blue and green and high contrast in the background.
I really wish I could paint a dog even close to this level of details. But your work is inspiring and I will try hopefully soon.
Thanks Sandy and Tom!
Thanks Sunnylady - also I agree with you regarding the background. I added a wash of liquid white over it to make it look more like an out of focus background.
The wash of liquid white toned it down nicely! Now the dog is the focus! Love it!
Great painting of a beautiful doggy!
I think you did great by removing those bright colors of green and blue and dog now is standing so well against the background and now 3 dimensional and a focal point.
Which way do you like it more yourself?
Sunnylady - I definitely like the muted background. When I was about 3/4 finished with the painting, I felt like the green (especially the darker green on the right) was weird and bothered my eye. I thought about correcting it but I thought I would put it up here first to see if it was just me or if others would also feel it was too dark. Thanks for your honest feedback!
No problems at all. I am glad I could be helpful.
I think with pet portraits it needs to be like with people portraits. Attention needs to be on the main subject. I think in classical portraiture there are never bright backgrounds which makes a person to stand out very well.
I hope one day I will attempt my pet portrait and hope it will be half as good as what you do.
Thank you sunnylady for your kind words
This is amazing I have had German short hairs my whole life. And for you to be able to incorporate animals into bob’s paintings is just amazing. Do you do any kind of teaching over the internet.? I would love to learn to paint basic animals in some of this art I’m doing. I would be a great student Lol. You’re such a great artist. I would be very generous to learn from you. Thank you for sharing all your work. So inspiring to me.
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So beautiful! Love his face and his fur looks fantastic!