Last year (2017), I started receiving Christmas orders as early as September, which kept me busy throughout the season. From mid-October onwards, I worked 10-12 hours a day, creating a schedule list for each day to ensure that all the portraits were completed on time. Some orders were from overseas, and I had to make sure that any frames ordered were received well in advance as framers tend to be very busy during the festive season. My goal was to finish all the orders a week before I travelled to my hometown of Chesterfield, but I worked late into the night before my journey.

Fortunately, everything went smoothly, and the person who commissioned it met me at the train station in Chesterfield to collect the portrait of Star the Chow Chow. The painting had travelled with me for six hours on a bus, coach, and train inside my suitcase. The lady who commissioned the painting gave me a lovely bunch of flowers. I was delighted to see the recipients' positive comments on Christmas day after receiving their beloved pets' portrait. Click on any of the images to visit the progress pages.

I've completed all the Christmas commissions and took a well-deserved break to recharge. Now, I'm back in the studio, creating new articles and planning exciting art workshops for 2018 on my Step by Step Art website. There are numerous tasks to accomplish behind the scenes. If you're interested in booking a personalized commission or are an artist searching for helpful articles, mini-tutorials, and a chance to attend a 1-day art workshop with me, click on the links below to visit my website.

Here's hoping 2018 is a wonderful year for you!

Karen

For those who are not aware, I also have an official 'Step by Step Art' website that allows you to book an art workshop, or read one of my articles, that cover a plethora of art related subjects including coloured pencils, paper reviews and pastel reviews too. The article section is still in the early stages but I will continue to add more articles as often as possible.  My latest article focus's on coloured pencil brands, as I trial a selection of coloured pencil brands, which I currently have in my personal collection. 

This article shows the 5 most important factors that I look for when selecting my professional pencil range:

• I need to have a range that allows multiple layering
• I need them to blend well for backgrounds and skin tones
• Will work well with fixative
• The pencils must be extremely lightfast and the colours strong
• Need soft and hard pencils for different areas of my work

This article also gives information on the importance of paper weight (gsm), information on each pencil including costs (GBP) and lightfast ratings as well as my own thoughts on 'adapting to coloured pencils' . I hope that this will be of help to all coloured pencil artists out there from those starting out looking to buy their first range to those interested in how each brand compares to the others.  

The very popular Prismacolor Premier & Verithin ranges will also be added to this article very soon and an adaptation of this article (with even more information in) will be available to view and purchase (download or hard copy) from the USA's Colored pencil Magazine 'Student' version in the next few months.
Find out more about this magazine here: Colored pencil magazine - Student Edition

and happiness to their owners and deserve their memorial portraits, reminding us every day of those happy times spent together and the special bond we have.

There were a few pieces I was unable to complete for the deadline (Springer Spaniel above) as I did not want to rush them being so detailed however, all these pieces will be added to my website with their dedicated page as to how they were completed and for those available for sale, a chance to purchase the original or buy a print or 2.

Details will be added on my News page once the Magazine is out (June Issue) with a link to the website where you can purchase a Print copy or a digital copy to download. This magazine is a must for any Coloured pencil lover or for anyone simply wishing to read 'my story' as it's the one and only time I'll share it publicly.   

Costs are as follows:
Printed Copy       $5.99      £3.87*      €5.46*        Delivery (1 - 2 weeks)   USA $4.06      UK £2.96*
Digital Copy        $2.99      £1.93*      €2.72* 

*Due to exchange rate, these prices may vary

It appears that my side of the art studio is full of Boxer dog artwork at the moment. I have been asked to produce quite a few boxer dog portraits over the years, although I do all other breeds and pets too. 
I am currently completing three separate coloured pencil portraits for customers, which are as follows: 

10" x 12" of Holly
8" x 10" of Lennox
12" x 16" trio of Boxers called ABBIE, DOLLY & ARTHUR

Holly (far right) is nearing completion now and I hope to finish it tonight dependant on my obsessive 'tweaking' necessity. The trio of Boxers (top) are still in the very early stages and the base tones are currently being applied, so the fine detail has yet to be added.  This is the second portrait I am completing of Lennox (bottom left), the first portrait was completed last year and his Mum, who absolutely loves her boy, wanted another portrait and chose this lovely pose of him. You can view all the portraits together on this page HERE


If you are looking to commission your own pet portrait and wish to find out more, you can find some information on my COMMISSIONS page, just drop me a line if you have a bespoke portrait idea - I love a challenge!

I have been creating Pet portraits since the 90's and as with any Artist, we all have to start somewhere meaning many of my earlier pieces are not of the same standards that I create now 20 years later. This is due to a collection of factors such as the obvious one, years of practice on my part but also largely because camera equipment is far more advanced and can now capture higher quality photos for use as reference images than ever before resulting in an high quality piece of Artwork at the end - however my Art has advanced beyond simply copying a photograph and the example seen above is one of these pieces.

Introducing Ern the Chocolate Labrador...
The photograph above right is such a beautiful capture I thought it would make the perfect reference image however I could tell straight away that his mouth was not closed completely resulting in a puffed mouth, the other factors were the over exposed and under exposed areas of his face due to the strong sunlight and finally the detail in the neck area had been lost in the shadows - for me to be able to create a portrait of Ern, I needed to even all these areas out, this was going to be a rather long process and included the use of around 15 different images, some of Ern himself and the others of Chocolate Labradors in the same type of stance found on the Internet - searching for these kind of images was not easy and it took a good few hours, a little editing but mostly imagination after extensive research.  Deciding the final colour tones of Ern was not an easy one either as each photo I had of him all differed and he looked much darker after he had been in the water, so I chose to apply coppery undertones first and darken the finer fur as I went along to create a balance between the 2.  The hardest part of Ern was making sure his mouth was anatomically correct after all this was going to be a surprise gift to his Dad and if anyone knew Ern the most it would be the owners.  With a little help from our lovely Black Labrador Haze, posing in the garden (having bribed him a tad with treats) I could both study him in the flesh and take some images to pull detail from too.  Over all the time spent on this portrait must have been around 25 hours, maybe more! The final portrait is shown above left and here is the feedback from the owners - I think I got it right in the end then!? ;)

I am very proud to say that for the 2nd year running, one of my Coloured Pencil pieces has been selected for the UKCPS Open International Exhibition.

This year the Exhibition will be held at the
Patchings Art Centre,
Oxton Road
Calverton
Notts
NG14 6NU

All Artworks have been selected anonymously making this a fair selection process for all Artists, both Amateur & Professionals alike.

It is also worth noting if you are a budding Artist yourself that the venue also has an Arts & Crafts Materials shop that may be worth a visit at the same time!
http://www.patchingsartcentre.co.uk/art_craft_materials_nottingham/art_craft_materials_shop.php

The Exhibition begins on the 1st September and is available to view by the public until the 6th of October 2013

A couple of my Coloured Pencil Artworks were put on show at the New Revenues Hall in the Chesterfield Town Centre, Derbyshire in March 2013.

The newly refurbished Customer Service centre opened on the 7th of March 2013, and I was asked, alongside local photographer, Les Wilcockson, to be the first to showcase our work at this venue for 2 months.

This finished on the 15.05.13

From: 6th of October - 25th November 2012

This was the first year that I have entered one of my Artworks in
The 11th Annual UKCPS Open International Exhibition.
Very rarely do I enter my work into Exhibitions and Competitions but as this was for the UK Coloured pencil Society, being very passionate about both the medium and raising the profile of Coloured pencils as a serious medium, I decided to enter my Snow Leopard which was produced in a selection of Coloured pencils including Karisma, Derwent Coloursoft & Caran Dache to name a few and produced on Black Colourfix paper, thoroughly enjoying the process from start to finish. The Exhibition enteries were also to be judged by Dr Sally Bulgin - Managing Director & Editor of "The Artist"
Graham Brace, founder member of the UKCPS and Leah Lister, Marketing Manager at Derwent. 
Although 'Snow Queen' did not bring any awards home for her Mum, I was pleasantly surprised to find an envelope drop through my letterbox full of 'Voting slips' from the public who visited the Exhibition.  Here are a selection of comments received from some of those visitors, of which I would like to extend a HUGE Thank you for your 'votes' and Thanks to Pat Heffer for sending them

"Amazing skill & patience. Beautiful markings. Excellent depiction of subject"
"Why no prize???"
"Stunning! The eyes follow you!"
"Superb detail. Stunning"
"Absolutely fabulous"
"Beautiful detail and features"
"Outstanding! A wonderful picture!"
"Blown away by the detail in the picture. Amazing likeness"

To see the winner selections of the judges, please click HERE