"Dr. Christian Bessmer" as it Progressed

To begin a portrait, I will sit with the client and discuss what they want.

Is the portrait a gift? For Whom?

Where will it hang?

What is the feeling you would like to convey?

etc.....

Then I schedule a photo session with the subject(s).

Since I have a digital camera and I'm pretty adept at Photoshop the fact that there were multiple subjects for this one wasn't scary.

You can cut and paste the best photo of each subject together to get the best overall portrait.

This was the best photo of Dr. Bessmer.

And this was the best photo of Lola.

This was the best photo of Princess.

Then go into Photoshop and erase all the extraneous details .....

Then put them all together....

Then I played with background colors and liked this the best.

Now I get to go to canvas.

Finally, some updates on the progress of this portrait.

As with other paintings I use the grid method to draw the images onto the canvas. I try to keep the lines to a minimum. They disappear anyway when you block in the basic colors.

I worked in the background first. Then started to put in the main colors.

Not too much detail yet. Just main color blocks.

I didn't want to loose the lines on the sweater so I based them in with a medium blue so that I would see them when I put the lighter color over them.

Still blocking in color here.

About 15 -20 hours work done so far.

Almost all blocked in now. I'm still not doing too much detail work yet.

Worked alot on both dogs faces and some on their bodies. I think Princess (far right) is coming along nicely.

This is about 30-35 hours work done.

Now I'm about 40 hours into this portrait. Lola's face (dog on lap) is about right, but Christian's face is not. I may have to do another photo session with him.

His sweater is coming along nicely. I've taken out a lot of the rumpled look and thinned him out some.

Added details to Lola's body and to Christian's pants and hands.

Here's the photo from the second photo session with Dr. Bessmer. Much better shot of him.

Now to incorporate it into the painting.

So I will have to admit that I had reached a point where I knew his face wasn't quite right, but I was having real trouble figuring out why. So....

Through the wonder of digital photography and computers, I was able to produce this image, complete with grid lines so I could compare the two faces.

And the problems with the painting are blatant.

Now I'm off to the canvas to correct them.

So.... I lowered his chin, brought the eye on the right down and moved his smile down. Much better!