Teddy Bear Boy

Teddy Bear is a pit bull who lives in Oregon. I met his "Mom", Sarah in an internet chat group several years ago, and then in 2000, she and Teddy drove across the country to join others from the group at our annual DogFest in Pittsburgh. It was a great surprise, and I felt privileged to have met them. Contrary to popular belief, most pit bulls are sweet-tempered, delightful dogs. Teddy is an old softy, and one of the most wonderful dogs it has ever been my honour to meet. I fell in love with him on the spot.

This is stage one of the portrait. I sketched in the main pose from the photographs Sarah sent me, and began drawing from the top left to the lower right in order to avoid smudging.

Sarah is involved in Pit Bull rescue, and is a very vocal advocate for these wonderful dogs. Teddy Bear is a licenced therapy dog, and an admirable specimen of his breed. If politicians have their way, this breed and others will disappear. Dogs like Teddy Bear will no longer have the right to exist.

I actually had to re-do the beginning stages of this piece. While preparing a canvas for another painting, I splattered gesso on the partly finished drawing on my draughting board. Aaargh!!

I'd been struggling with the portrait anyway, since the jpgs I'd been sent for reference were rather small, and I didn't have much detail to work with. It soon became evident that there wasn't enough detail to complete the piece, particularly around the eyes, so I asked Teddy's Mom if the original prints were available or if she could send me some higher-resolution images. Since I'd already damaged the first one, I stopped work on it. She sent me the prints, and they were much better references.

Almost finished the first layer of pastel.

Once the first coat's done, I asked Teddy's Mom if there was anything that needed changing, since once it's sprayed with fixative, I can't make changes. At this stage, it looks okay from a distance, but it's still rather rough in execution.

Once I get the okay to go ahead, I spray it with the first coat of fixative (I use Krylon workable fixative), and leave it to dry for a couple of hours. Then I cover all but the area I'm working on (upper left corner) with a piece of smooth bond paper to prevent smudging, and begin to add detail and smooth out the roughness.

  Because the fix darkens down the lights and midtones, I have to go back in and rework those areas.  At this stage, I add in most of the fine detail. You can see where I've done the second coat on the ear and the eye. On the right side, the light tones have darkened down, and the finish is still very rough.

Once the second layer has been done, I give it another and final spray with the fixative.  Again, the lights darken down, but the final coat of pastel is almost all whites and light colours.  The last thing to be done is the whiskers and the highlights.  The speckles and dark spots have now disappeared, and the work is ready to frame.

The finished product.
It has been scanned and colour-corrected in order to make prints. The original is carefully packaged to be shipped to Oregon. Now that the colour-correction is done, I will be able to use this image in a series of dog portrait art cards, or any other printed items, such as mouse pads, coffee mugs, t-shirts or jigsaw puzzles.