A Challenging Third Year!
I can’t believe another year has flown by! It’s now been over three years since I took the leap into full-time pet portraiture — and what a journey it’s been. I though it would be good, therefore, to take a moment to reflect and share a few highlights (and hurdles) from the past 12 months.
This year has definitely brought its share of challenges, but growth often comes through overcoming obstacles so in this and the next couple of blogs, I’ll spotlight three portraits that not only showcase my recent work, but also some of the creative problem-solving that goes on behind the scenes.
The first one was a special commission of two A3 portraits — a pair of beautiful, much-loved cats. The client wanted each portrait to be unique yet clearly part of a set. We decided on matching backgrounds: both cats posed on the staircase, one sitting alert and upright and the other lounging in a characteristically relaxed pose.
As always, I worked closely with the client to gather reference photos. Cats aren’t known for cooperating with photo shoots, but the clients (as well as the cats!) persevered, and I ended up with some great images to work from.
To unify the portraits while keeping the focus on each cat, I simplified the background, added a subtle depth blur, and carefully colour-matched the lighting across both images. Cropping and composition also played a big role — something that’s easy to overlook, but vital to making the subject really stand out.
Although I usually work in coloured pencils, I opted for pastels for this project. They allowed me to create that soft, dreamy bokeh background while keeping the foreground crisp and detailed — just the look I was aiming for.
The client was thrilled and described the portraits as “extraordinary” — which made my day! The final touch was finding the right presentation box. After trying several options that I wasn’t quite happy with, I decided to have a bespoke box made by The Tiny Box Company — and they came through brilliantly at short notice.
It was such a rewarding project to work on, and I loved the challenge of creating a pair of cohesive yet individual pieces. In my next post, I’ll share a portrait that involved some tricky perspective work — and a surprise paper swap!