Photo Perfect

One question I frequently get asked is, what medium do I use? Well, over the years I've used everything from watercolors to oils, but when I started to paint on rocks for the Kindness Project, I learned about paint pens. Now there are probably a hundred different brands of paint pens and I've tried at least 10 of them. After all the trials and errors I have found my favorite brand. Uni Posca Paint Pens are the bomb! My absolute favorite pens in the whole universe! They have wonderful coverage, go on smooth and best of all they are water soluble, which for me is perfect because I tend to make a lot of messes. They come in a range of colors, although not many colors so when I paint, I've learned how to blend the pens to create new colors or hues. which brings me to how the pens correlate with the pet portraits. When I look at a reference photo, I see shapes and colors, i don't really see the image as an image. Depending on the lighting in the photo, each hair on an animal reflects light giving us what we perceive a color. For example, a black dog to me has shades of blues, greys and browns while a calico cat can have shades of purples, oranges and pinks. This is something to keep in mind when deciding on photos to submit. The better the lighting, the more colors I see and result in a better painting. If you have any doubts about your reference photos you want to submit, you can always send me multiple photos and sometimes i can piece them together. Also please feel free to reach out to me for any question or concerns.