animals, dogs, dogs, horses, cats, Illustrations, Odd Little Stories

Staffordshire called Trixie

Here is my sweet and very smart old pup “Trixie”. I rescued her in our early days in California. It was in 1976 in the San Fernando Valley. There were a bunch of unruly boys in the neighborhood playing mean games with her. Putting meat on a rope and hanging it from a tree. They set up a lever/pulley system to amuse themselves. She would grab on to the meat and they would hoist her up the tree and as she locked her jaws, they partied. I stole her and she was our rescue dog for a few years after that. I took her everywhere with me: shopping and to work too. She was my little guard dog when I worked in Culver City. When I had my first son, she was wonderful with the baby.

We had another dog at the time that the veterinarian suggested we find a home for. I remember him saying that in some situations, dogs cant accept the new baby. The new baby was more than the Labrador could handle. So I gave the lab away because they were fighting. It was dangerous but I took care of it right away. When we moved to the country, it was great for a while but she disappeared one night. She showed up a few days later; hungry, tired, very dirty. I tried everything to keep her but she kept going out into the hills and then she just disappeared. A few weeks after she left, one morning I took my binoculars and aimed towards the distant rolling hills. I saw her. She had taken up with 3 wild dogs and they were hunting together. My heart was broken. I loved her so and knew now she would never come back. I think of her still. I think of her a lot. I miss you sweet Trixie. You could not help being the dog you were. There was nothing I could do. Here is the digital drawing of her.

dogs, dogs, horses, cats, Tablet Drawing

Painting dogs

Some dogs of course just touch your heart. I’ve been tablet drawing and have an idea of what I want but still have a ways to go. To me the most important thing is to try to capture the personality of the dog. Digital sketching gets a little bizarre with animal fur brushes. Tablet drawing works great if you have a plan. A good plan is to keep it as simple as possible and everything to a minimum. I think I’m looking for something in between a traditional portrait with the flare of digital. Then if I could master lighting, that’s where I want to be.

I’m not at all happy with the below image. I will do it over but I just take a black and white shot to get an idea of the values. As you can see, there are more problems than values. It’s a mixed up mess with wrong brushes used for what I’m looking for. There are blacks in here that are way too dark and the piece has no continuity. His beautiful eyes are lost. The next version will begin with line art and then use selections for 4 values in grey scale to use as my flats. Onward and don’t give up.

dogs, horses, cats, humor, Illustrations, Pen and Ink Drawing, whimsy

That’s Mine…cat fight

pen and ink

We’ve all seen this. It’s not really a fight but more of a stand-off. The big guy walks around with a shadow of his former self on his back. See his alter ego white cat with the green eyes and reverse calico markings on his back. Just in case you didn’t guess, he’s just a gentle soul because he also has a butterfly on his head. Fun. This one will definitely appear in my small picture book series. Number 1 on friendship is complete, number 2 in process…it’s about lunch. what? yup. Just fun stuff.

animals, dogs, horses, cats, Illustrations, kids, simple photoshop, thoughts behind the work, whimsy

I need to find me a cat, design

find-a-cat-leaves

I am very happy with this drawing.  Maybe things are falling into place with this effort.  The leaves are a watercolor that I scanned and brought into photoshop.  The cats were added in layers in line art and colored in.  Everything was done after that on my tablet. Hey, I only crashed Ps once, and I think that’s because I got distracted with a visitor and had a feeling it would happen.  I was away too long and by the time I hit save, I knew it was too late.  But I did not lose too much as I just had to paint in more of the pale turquoise leaves.  This happened once before for the same reason.  my fault.   ALSO, as  time goes on I will learn how to manage things better and make smaller files.  I am getting more and more comfortable working with text.

This is kind of new territory for me and it’s really been fun. Here is the drawing on products.  and boy this product line is getting bigger every day. what fun!

Let me know what you think about this dear readers.  I would love feedback.  I am getting closer to my goal.

animals, dogs, horses, cats, Illustrations, Revising Old Work

Appaloosa in Training

young trainer.web

This is a young girl I knew in California as a very talented and hard working young trainer.  I did this watercolor of her with an underpainting in soft pink tones.  She is resurrected here.  Enjoy.

Follow my journey, see my products