The first pet portrait I painted in 2024 also happened to be the largest commissioned portrait one I have ever done! As well as the largest painting I have ever done, aside from when I painted on my bedroom walls when I was a kid.

This is Talladega, and his portrait was painted with acrylics on a 30 x 40 inch stretched canvas, and completed in February 2024 over a period of about 2 weeks. He was painted in an experimental blend between my colorful realism and natural colors styles. The background is a gradient of magenta, purple, and blue, with some bold square brushstrokes over the top in those same colors, as well as some small paint splatters. I call this style ‘confetti’ since it kind of reminds me of confetti you throw at parties and gets everywhere. In one of the photos, he was lying on a blanket, and I used that as a general reference point to create a more abstract teal colored blanket that matched the background colors.

The cat portrait maintains most of his original coloration, as a grey tabby cat. But I added in some brushstrokes of blue, yellow, and even pink, blended into the grey of his fur, to give it more depth and an interesting look. The portrait is actually a general combination of about 4 different photographs, one of which was used for the pose. All of the photos of the cat were very dark and a little blurry, and several of them were foreshortened from being taken too close to the camera. I did my best to correct the foreshortening while keeping the overall shape of the cat consistent, which was a challenge. There was one closeup view which clearly showed his eye color and markings very well, but it was washed out and too bright, and also distorted a bit. The eyes in the photo showed age related changes, and I captured that to the best of my ability in the portrait.

Such are the limitations when working from photos; sometimes you just don’t get a good one. And many of the portraits I have done were gifts for a friend or family and they did not have many photos to use, or the pet in question had passed, so there was limited material to work with. Also sometimes, the customer is limited by their own equipment, and they only have a cheap cell phone to snap a few pics. Sometimes the pet just isn’t photogenic or does not like having their picture taken, and so good references of that pet are hard to come by. And lastly people typically just take candid shots of their pets without thinking about if it is a good photo or would make a good portrait. This is why I always ask the customers for multiple photos; the more they can provide the better the outcome of the portrait. I can always pull some details from other photos that may be missing, correct a pose, composite several photos into a unique new reference, or get their colors in a better light source that may be different from the one with the best pose.

As a pet portrait artist, I have learned to use my artistic license to create the portraits to the best of my ability within the limitations of the reference material I am provided. While some artists refuse to work with suboptimal reference photos, I accept it as a challenge, and create a work of art trying to capture the pet’s personality and spirit, even if it is not exactly photo-realistic. That is my niche and I am proud of having the ability to do this for customers, as well as add a colorful flair to the portrait to make it fun and different.