BLOG

Casey's portrait is finished. When I asked Doug to tell me about Casey, he wrote: “What do I say about Casey!? If he could talk, he would say that I love to be on the lap of my dad, Doug! I feel safe there and I hope he enjoys my company on his lap! Casey loves people and enjoys people....especially if I am around and he has the security of my presence and he can enjoy the children and my grandchildren as well. He is a "chill" dog and just loves life...not high strung at all

I'm working on the Monarch butterfly using the same colors I used for Casey’s head. This balances the orange on the other end of Casey - the only orange in the artwork. As I was sending these in-progress pictures, Doug wrote: “I just have to tell you that for 3 days in a row I have seen a monarch butterfly outside my window!!!! ” The grass around Casey was not yet finished. Only the grass blades to the left of him have been added with colored pencil over the green underpaint

Still working on the grass around Casey.... The grass in the upper part of this pic was done with colored pencils on the white paper. Then I added a green watercolor underpainting in the entire lower half of the scene, all around Casey’s body (which is mostly the white paper showing). Look at the watercolor wash on the white paper near the bottom: notice I made two passes with the wash. The first one was too light and too yellow. So I mixed a darker, cooler green and added a

Yesterday I described how I used a blue watercolor wash for the sky. Today I made a green underpainting for the grass and trees. That gives me a green base color, similar to working on green paper, which saves a lot of work covering the white of the paper with green pencils. I leave the white paper showing for Casey’s white coat. 1 Here's a close-up of part of the underpainting. In the upper part of this pic you can see the distant grass I did with colored pencils. Everythi

Skies are the reason I started using other mediums in my Colored Pencil art. There is just no way to make a sky as smooth, or as bright, with pencils. I have used pastel, watercolor, and acrylic, for skies. On colored paper I use an opaque medium (pastel, or acrylic paint) to completely cover the paper color. This sky is watercolor wash (a transparent medium) on white paper. I masked off the butterfly and the line of trees before I started. They were masked with friskit film,

I'm working on the landscape behind Casey. The artwork is really starting to come together now! The crop marks show where I’ll trim it down to the 12 x 13 size Doug requested. As you can see, I work past the edges of those 12 x 13 margins when I’m doing the landscape. This is the whole sheet of paper, scanned. I always work on larger paper and trim it down at the end. Sometimes I give the client the option to leave it as is, a bigger artwork than they paid for, if I think it

I haven't posted in a while. Sadly, I lost my sweet Doberman, Sara, to cancer over the past month. I was sharing this portrait of Casey, a Papillon, before Sara became ill. This is where I left off. I chose to work on white paper because Casey is mostly pure white. In this pic I’m outlining the white area of his body with green colored pencils to enclose him with the green surrounding him. That leaves the white of the paper for his coat, with a few strokes of pale-grey pencil

I rarely work on white paper. I decided to use white paper to capture Casey's pure white coat. Sometimes I choose a paper color that makes the background color, and create the figure on that paper color with colored pencils. In this case I am creating the background with colored pencils and leaving the white paper to create Casey's body. You can see where I’ve outlined Casey’s chest with green pencil to create the edge where green grass will make Casey’s white coat stand out.

Working on the portrait of “Casey”, a Papillon. “Papillon” is French for “butterfly”. The ears resemble butterfly wings. 1 This is a portion of the Photoshop layout I created, a composite of Doug’s photos, when Doug and I were working together to create a layout he would like. Casey’s portrait will have 5 butterflies. I deliberately placed a butterfly directly above his head that exactly mimics the shape of Casey’s ears. I made a black line outline of the butterfly in the sky

I’m starting a portrait of “Casey”, a Top 25 Papillon. “Papillon” is French for “butterfly”. Their ears resemble butterfly wings. Doug asked me to include colorful butterflies in the portrait. This post describes how I designed the layout and background with Doug’s input. 1 Doug sent about 20 photos. This was his favorite of Casey, taken at the 2026 Papillon National. Photo by Alexandria Darienzo (Lexi D Photography) 2 These photos show Casey’s ears the best. Since I am not s