-January/February 2010

-14"x10"

Sophie and Billy's owners are in Kent so they were local enough to come and see me and deliver their photos before I began their portrait. They had a fantastic range of photographs which they had taken of Sophie and Billy so the hard part was deciding which two photos to use for the portrait.

We spread out the photos and they picked out their favourites among them. The rest of the photos were of good use to me still as they gave me a good idea overall of what the dogs looked like. Sophie & Billy's owners were not sure whether to opt for oils or coloured pencils so I showed them some examples that I was working on at the time and they took a shine to the coloured pencil drawing so that's what they decided on.

The portrait has worked very well in coloured pencils as the short hair and fine detail can be described perfectly with delicate strokes.

Many layers of pencil went into this portrait to show the correct colour and textures of their lovely shiny coats. Boxers are a joy to paint and draw, I love that they are so playful and puppylike even into their old age!