Zekie's Portrait

Each quarter I'm planning to send a little "thank you" to the people who have bought my ACEOs - a print of one that I won't be selling the original of.

Since I'm donating the proceeds of my sales to two animals charities - Idaho Black Bear Rehab and Fat Kitty City, the subjects of these "thank you" ACEOs will be animals from those shelters.  Here's the first one, my little cat Zekie who came to me, along with his brother Starbuck, from Fat Kitty City.

I thought you might like to see the three main stages of the painting once the drawing is done.

The first photo shows the main under-colors blocked in.  I always start with the eyes and tend to take them farther than the other parts of the animal on this first pass.  I also begin the background.  Since this background is simple, I went ahead and pretty much finished it, getting it to the value I want.  By the way, I'm using Caran d'Ache Neocolor I crayons for the squigglies.  They resist the thinned acrylic that I painted over them.

The second photo shows the majority of the fur detail done.  Oddly enough, I rather enjoy the tedium of painting all those little lines.  And, yes, I do them with a liner brush and not a pen - a '00' script liner.  I prefer the liner to the pen because I can get nice pointed ends on the brush strokes whereas the pen strokes have blunt ends.

The third photo shows the finished product.  I've added color washes, final liner detailing, and highlights in the eyes.