This black Labrador Retriever is another example of how black fur still works well in graphite pencil, and an example of a full body composition.
The final portrait size was A3 size which I have to scan as two A4 scans and stitch together. I'm considering upgrading to an A3 size scanner sometime as I'm sure it would save a whole load of time for scanning and give more detail. Maybe next year! I finish most of my dog portraits with some context detail, especially when the dog is sitting. In this example I lightly drew some of the grass around his paws. http://www.portraits-online.com/art-blog/labrador-retriever-portrait-graphite-pencil-drawing Young Murphy was a dog a drew in two phases of his life in one composition; as a young pup and as an adult dog. It ise quite common to bring dogs together into one portrait composition from several different photos, but quite unusual to have the same dog on one composition. This was actually a portrait a drew a few years back and the scanner I used then wasn't so good in capturing all the detail, but thought it might be a good example to use for the idea anyway.
http://www.portraits-online.com/art-blog/dog-portrait-pencil-drawing-pup-and-adult A drawing of a Border Collie with graphite pencil. He has one blue and one brown eye which is still hopefully apparent in this graphite drawing.
http://www.portraits-online.com/art-blog/border-collie-portrait-pencil-drawing A watercolour portrait of a German Shepherd called Azeka. Azeka was rescue dog and sadly passed away in 2009. Here you can read a more about Azeka and the good work of German Shepherd Rescue Scotland.
http://www.portraits-online.com/art-blog/german-shepherd-portrait-watercolour-painting Watercolour paint works well even when the fur is mostly black. I always start with the eyes when painting a dog portrait because this is where their character is most expressive in their face. The sun reflection off the black helps to add lighter contrast to the black fur. Including a dog collar often helps too to add balance to a head portrait for dogs, but in this example he didn't have one.
http://www.portraits-online.com/art-blog/black-lab-portrait-in-watercolour |
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