Another pony

This one is not for sale.

Trying a bit of a new techique

I don't usually do the smudgy thing with pictures, more prefer to work mainly with pencil strokes and maybe the odd smudging, but this one I did almost entirely shaped by a smudge stick and I must say, I'm impressed with the outcome.

Picture of foal and mare's muzzle, I'm giving it away as a Christmas gift, so no sales here.

Pet Portraits

Pet portraits are hard things, sometimes, because a lot of the time the picture is a digital snapshot where parts are in good definition and others are blurred out. Which means a lot of guess work and artistic license on my end.

They are also tricky as I have not spent an extensive amount of time around the animal, and have to, in the few hours I spend with a couple of photographs, capture both the personality and individuality of each animal. Some more expressive portraits make it easy, other plain ones make it hard. No one wants a portrait of some random dog or cat, they want THEIRS.

This becomes increasingly more important depending on the situation... for example, if the animal is deceased. Which is what I'm working with over 50% of the time.

Usually I add more detail in the fur and eyes in an attempt to bring the picture to life and give them more of a spark than the photograph provides me. The thing that makes the most difference is the eye. If I can create a lifelike, expressive eye, the other details I might have missed are usually forgiven because the eye of an animal is the most individual aspect.


This portrait I most recently completed is from FV Appaloosas. Thank you so much for your support, FV!

Taking the step to colored portraits

Alright, so I've played around with color enough and invested in more professional supplies. I've done a few color portraits here and there, but never really offered it as a big option. So, I'm starting the advertising in the next few days here and getting the word out that colored pencil portraits are now available!

Thank you to my friend Cass for the picture of her horse Hudson!

Scanned images

Took the time to scan the fox and the wolf

First real go at the new colored pencils

So here is a new wolf portrait I did. I cheated a little in this one in that I kept the eye color from my reference photo. By this age, wolves' eyes have gone from blue to brown, but the eye in the reference grabbed me so much that I had to put it in there. I played around with a lot of purples and blues in this fur tone, just for the sake of seeing how they acted, and then blended greens and yellows together in the background in an attempt to bring out the yellow tones in the fur. I'm still "getting there" with these colored pencils, but as they say it is practice, practice, practice.

I'm currently in Houston right now (if you note my website, it says I am based in both Houston and Edmonton, to cater to both USA and Canada), but as soon as I get back to Canada I am really going to hit up the art store and get a bunch of single Prismacolors. I think I'll have to pick up a few whites and blacks, those are ALWAYS the first to go, and then some different brown and grey tones as I am mainly going to be working with animals. Maybe some skin tones too, but we'll see how broke this artist gets before then! I really am loving this colored business, I haven't touched graphite for a couple weeks now, but I do love that too. I'll just have to work at both.

So, here is the "incorrect" wolf!

Saying goodbye to Crayola and hello to Prismacolor!

So here's most likely one of the last Crayola projects. Yet one more piece of childhood to let go, hey? I ended up getting a box of Prismacolor pencils, which I hear high praise of everywhere, and a box of Koh-I-Noor woodless colored pencils, which I have never heard of before. Both feel great to work with!

So here is the fox picture. I plan on selling this one, and when I decide on a pricing system for colored pencils I will post that as well.



So, my first thing with the Prismacolors was a leopard eye study. I had a look at an online tutorial by big cat artist Christina Langman and decided to play around with a few colors. This woman's colored pencil artwork has floored me on a few occasions, so my work is nothing in the light of hers, but I was pretty impressed with myself, given my first-time attempt!



Once again, thank you Christina for the tutorial!

More Crayola fun - Horse Eye Study

So every once in a while, every artist needs to sit down and do one study or another. Because I enjoyed my last adventures with Crayola pencil crayons, I decided to explore deeper into the world of colored pencils. I've been meaning to invest in some Prismacolor pencils for a long time now, but as 99.9% of all of my commissions and works are graphite, I've never gotten around to it.

So I've decided to take the time to properly learn about proper coloring and layering. You never know, maybe something will come of it!

I started with what has always been a problem for me, the eye. I found a horse eye tutorial online for colored pencils, so this really isn't just from me, but I loved the result so much that I decided to share.



It's not very big, only about 4 x 4 inches. But I really do love what came of it.

Fun with Crayola!

Who said art is expensive? Some standard art paper, a normal HB pencil and some Crayola pencil crayons and voila!

A piece of a Cutting Horse commission

You'll be seeing a lot more cutting horses on this end! I just recently got in contact with someone who has gotten me to do a couple of cutting pieces, and there will be more to come.

Generally I don't post commissions with people in them, not the full ones anyways. So here's a look at just part of the new piece:

New Cow-Horse

14 x 17 original graphite of a working cow horse rolling back on a cow. My family kept asking when I was going to shade in the DOG. That's really good for my artistic ego, don't you think?

"Charge" oil paiting

I don't often work with oil paint, but when I do, I love the experience. This piece is 9 x 12 inches on thick quality paper.
$250.00

Reiner

Okay so this is my latest work, a reining spin. I ended up doing this portrait over a period of four days, and I'm quite pleased with the result.

I am selling this portrait at $225.00 for the original and $50.00 for prints. Please e-mail me at rewritingmondays@gmail.com to inquire about a purchase or visit my website for more details.

Reiner work-in-progress

Generally, I tend to photo-log the progress of my artwork. It's good for future reference and it also helps to show the techniques used. Also, it helps me to show my fellow artists and get tips and advice as I go along from another artistic eye.

This specific piece is completely different than anything I've done before, specifically in the pose of the animal. It's a horse in the middle of a reining spin and as I have never drawn this kind of pose (or anything close to it) before, it's a challenge as all of the muscles are in different contours than what I am used to. However, I am enjoying embracing the challenge and am pleased with the current result.

Work in progress:

Mel S Portraits

Though I specialize in equine art, I often work with many pet and people portraits. I have been drawing since I could hold a pencil, and in the past few years I have opened commissions to other people and sold multiple originals.

I got the idea to blog my artwork from a good Blogger friend of mine, FernValley, and have acted on this idea in hopes of promoting my artwork to a wider audiences. I plan to showcase new pieces as well as talk about some methods and techniques I use behind the pencil.

Please visit my website for more details on my artwork!