I have finally finished the portrait of the two cats. Whew! It was a long process, but I am very pleased with the result. The final image is about 8.5" high X 15" wide, so I had to scan each cat in separately and combine them in Photoshop to get them all in one image here.
I added some shading in blue underneath each cat to give them some grounding within the drawing. I chose blue because it contrasts nicely with the orange color of the cats, and in one of the photos I worked from, the cat was sitting on a blue blanket.
Comments are welcome!
The second cat is coming along. I've done additional layering, further defining the dark stripes, which help to give shape to the body. I've layered the orange on top of that so my next step will be to continue to fill in shade/form with some of the more muted colors to tone down the orange. Getting closer to the finish!
I am continuing my work on the cats portrait. I've tweaked the first cat enough that I think it is mostly finished. I've switched my focus to the second cat at the moment. Starting to fill in the markings and initial layers of color.
I did a good bit of layering last night and was able to get the first cat's fur color toned down and deepened. I also added a darker gray around the white areas to bring those out and add some shading. I still have some tweaking to do, but I really like where this is so far.
For the second cat, I started with the beginning layer of color, so I'm looking forward to getting that to a more finished point. In the end, I will need to add some color underneath both cats so they don't look like they are floating on air. :)
The colored pencil is progressing. I'm starting to fill in the fur and markings. I will continue to do the layering, using 4-5 different colors to reflect the shading in the fur. This will hopefully give some depth and form to each cat, making them look more lively on the page.
I haven't posted an update on my colored pencil cats portrait for awhile...I had made good progress, but then realized some of the proportions were off and I messed up the markings on the face. Big no-no if I want the owner of the cats to enjoy the artwork!
So, I decided to redraw the base drawing, fixing my proportions and markings. Lesson for all - one I have learned before, but apparently forgotten - make sure your original, base drawing is 100% correct before you begin with color or paint! If it isn't, it will never look quite right, no matter how nicely you render your colored pencil strokes or watercolor washes.
I finally came up with a base drawing that I feel is accurate (as compared to the photos, which is what I am working from...) What you see below is where I have begun to replace my base, graphite drawing with colored pencil (using light gray to mark in the outlines of various areas.) I did render the eyes first and was happy with the way that turned out, so I proceeded with the fur, beginning to add color to the first colored pencil layer.
Stay tuned for further updates! P.S. My scanner isn't large enough to capture the whole drawing in one scan, so I will just post pieces of it for now to demonstrate my progress.
I'm currently working on a pet portrait of two cats. I've only come as far as a preliminary sketch of each individual cat. I eventually will combine them into one composite illustration that I hope to render in colored pencil. These cats have lovely orange and white markings and I think they would be best represented in colored pencil.
