A Color Portrait of the Dog who walks with her nose in the Air!

Folks,

Last Week I did this Color Portrait of my Dog. You’ve already seen the Pen and Ink Portrait of my Canine Lady…now I present the color pencil portrait done using the same reference picture.

Here’s the reference photo with the final artwork.

Reference Photo with Final Artwork (Frame Representational) Actual Artwork: 8 inches by 10 inches. Medium: Color Pencils.

Here are some more images in a chronological order.

When I was just about start giving it the finishing touches.

It’s almost done. Final Size of the Artwork: 8 inches by 10 inches. Check out her eyes and her nose 🙂

Finished – ready to be delivered (read the story about “how this portrait came to be” at the end of this post.)

 

Oorvi’s Pen and Ink Portrait on my Desk with the reference image on the screen.

Later…after the dust settled and the portrait got framed.

After Ms. Oorvi got her portrait framed, I took the opportunity to photograph it on my desk 🙂 (CLICK for a LARGER and CLEARER View.)

Now some backstory for those interested 🙂

Behind-the-Scenes Drama – How this Portrait Came to Be!

Some people and their dogs never cease their demands.

First they demanded a Pen and Ink Portrait of the canine lady in question; once that was done, they wanted more. This is how the conversation went between us – the pup had brought her owner and translator along.

An Innocent-eyed Pup: “Those color-pencils…”

A Curious Me: “Yes, what about them?”

A Stoic Pup: “You still have ’em, don’t you?”

A Confident Me: “Yep, I do.”

A Pushy Pup: “Why ain’t you using ’em?”

A Confused Me: “Because I’ve been busy working on my other assignments and they had to be done in Pen & Ink or painted digitally…that’s why.”

An Apparently Illogical Pup: “Don’t you think you should take ’em out…they could turn rusty, you know?”

A Gloating Me: “Pencils don’t turn rusty…”

A Persevering Pup: “or flaky?”

A Worried Me: “Come to the point.”

A Demanding Pup: “Do my color portrait.”

A Shocked Me: “What?!!”

An Ultra-specific-Down-to-the-Minutae Pup: “A color portrait – with my golden fur and green-brown eyes looking golden and green-brown.”

A Cautious Me: “What if I refuse?”

A Gloating Pup: “Remember the Pen & Inks that you are doing for that book…you’ve not scanned them yet, have you?”

A Filled-with-Trepedition Me: “No…but I will.”

A Smirking Pup: “Oh, yeah?”

So I rush to the drawer where I had them neatly stacked…only to find that the drawer had been denuded of its contents.

A Confident Pup: “You do my color portrait and you get them back. OK?”

A Defeated Me: “Hey, but color portraits are more expensive than the Pen and Ink ones…are you prepared to pay?”

A Triumphant Pup: “Sure…I’ll pay. I’ll give all those Pen and Ink drawings back, so that you can scan them, and send them to the client.”

This is how, ladies and gentlemen, A ” totally brow-beaten me” was brow-beaten into accepting a commission of a color pencil portrait of Ms. Oorvi. I did get my drawings back – all twenty-four of them…and I breathed a sigh of relief. 

 If you are interested in looking at my Pen and Ink Pet and Wildlife Portraits, I request you to visit my Pen and Ink Portraits blog here. I am open for pet-portraiture/wildlife art commissions and you are welcome to contact me with your requirements.

Advertisement

Abraham Lincoln’s Color Caricature – This should brighten everyone’s day!

I’ve returned from Qo’noS, 2375. I believe the members of Martok’s family were reasonably satisfied with my work, which is usually more than what a caricaturist can expect.

It must’ve been late at night when my pod entered the iOS7-iPhone 5C-charged atmosphere of earth. If you know me, you know that I hate the new buttons and I hate the fact that Steve Jobs told Tim Cook that he should run Apple the way Tim wanted to run it and not the way Steve would’ve run it. I think that made Tim Cook guilt-free. I mean who puts a hardware designer on UI design?!!! Only Tim Cook.

In the next few days, I expect people to start hating the new buttons more vociferously on the social media, and then Jobs will appear in Cook’s dream telling him to get the glossies back.

When I got out of the pod, I stepped on a piece of virtual paper that had colored circles on it. Curiosity made me pick it up (yeah, don’t start thinking that I go around picking stuff up from the ground.) It was Apple’s invitation. Drat. I had missed it, and the pod had disappeared – so I could only time-travel to the conference if I cranked up my clunky tin-box, which works on the invalid principle of going faster than light; and I wasn’t going to do that. The prospects of traveling in it repelled me, especially after having experienced the awesome Klingon time-pod!

Cutting a long story short, I must tell you that the launch of iPhone 5C in those drool-worthy candy-colors reminded me of my color caricatures that I had painted before time-and-space-hopping to Klingon.

Here’s Abraham Lincoln’s Caricature for you. This is based on the black-and-white illustration of Lincoln that I did a few years ago.

Actual Size at 300 dpi: 12 inches by 12 inches (the above image is cropped on the sides.)

 

Here’s the black and white illustration once again 🙂

What is he thinking?

 

I’ll return with an important post for Moms and Dads, so if you’ve a young child at home and you are wondering whether he or she’s possessed by the gremlins of art, I’ll give you some pointers to help you in your quest.

 

 

The Caricaturist drinks some Polyjuice Potion, changes into Luna Lovegood, and finds Bipasha’s portrait in Tom Riddle’s Diary.

I thought that it was OJ and I drank it. Actually, I was so thirsty that I didn’t really think, I just picked up the glass and drank all of it…and then asked for more. Whether the waiter poured more or not, I don’t recall – because I was already gone.

When I opened my eyes, I saw that I was in Professor Snape’s Potions class and…believe it or not, I was Luna Lovegood – a Ravenclaw. You won’t expect a caricaturist to be a Ravenclaw. A Griffindor perhaps, even a Hufflepuff – but definitely not a Ravenclaw. I know, you think that Hogwarts is fiction. I used to think the same, but now I know that it isn’t fiction. And I have proof.

You see, I brewed something in the potions class, and before leaving Hogwarts last night, I stashed it in my trunk. I still have it with me, and it proves that Hogwarts exists and so does magic.

I’ll present it to you soon enough, but let me tell you what it is that I brewed. I brewed Voldemort‘s diary! (What? I shouldn’t say that name! Why not? He’s no more. He died in the seventh book. Don’t you remember? <trolls!>)

So I brewed his diary…(What? No. I didn’t brew a horcrux. This was another diary that he kept, much before he had turned completely evil. And now, if you’ll please allow me to say what I had begun to say?…Thank you.)

I brewed Voldemort’s diary and guess what I must’ve found inside his diary?

I found a color portrait of Bipasha Basu!

I bet you didn’t know that young Tom Riddle was a fan a Bipasha Basu. I bet even Bips didn’t know that the Dark Lord was so smitten by her that he drew her color portraits in his diary. I am sorry for her loss of such a great fan, but I think that the world deserves to see this portrait of Bips that Voldemort drew in his diary.  I’ll soon scan it and post it here on my blog.

Special Message for the Fans of Harry Potter:

I am not auctioning off the diary, so please don’t bid for it. The diary and Bipasha’s portrait stay with me.

I must also tell you that Harry Potter’s seven years in Hogwarts were spent in the future, because Tom Riddle wrote in this diary in 2013! (Confused? Nah. It must be the Confundus charm that I used on you.)

November Blog Carnival Hits a Record Low with One Entry!

and the Caricaturist steps into the dark abyss of depression…HELP! SOS! Where’s the pulley?!!!

What will inspire them?!

The November Blog Carnival was a washout.  Here’s the only story that Romeo and Juliet could manage to wheedle out.

“The Love of my Life” a Short Story by the Canine Storyteller, the WiseK9 Oorvi.

This is the story of a modern day Juliet, her Romeo, and their servant Paris. The tale has a twist in its tail, which is natural because Oorvi’s own tail has a beautiful twist at its end.  BTW,  all those visitors who like my work might want to download the story in .pdf form too, as it contains a high-resolution, full-page image of the Colored Romeo and Juliet Caricature! I don’t do a lot of color (blame it on my aversion for time-consuming activities.)

But then there’s some good news too 🙂

1. Oprah Winfrey the Greatest Talk Show Host ever, and Sachin Tendulkar the God of Cricket are ready to make their appearance here. I am happy that they accepted my invitation. Right now, they are backstage, waiting for their cue to appear on the blog-stage and delight you. Amazing…isn’t it? Such famous people waiting for their turn to appear on my humble blog. Wow!

2. I, the renowned artist (yes, yes – go ahead…laugh all you want, but in my house everyone knows me – the picture above proves my claim,) known for her alacrity in matters of artistic workarounds that save time and effort, managed to push herself into creating her first pen-and-ink pet drawing. I’ve done pen-and-ink drawings before, but a pet, especially one who looks  like Albus Dumbledore is a very different and considerably formidable challenge. Every morning, I’d wake up wanting to do the drawing, but then I’d look at the sketch and think – what if I couldn’t?

I know no heavens would’ve fallen if I couldn’t…and I had the much easier option of reaching out for my color pencils – but I didn’t want to give in. This particular pet has a very special place in my heart and wanted to create what I had first thought of creating – a glamorous pen-and-ink drawing!

Yesterday, I drove myself to put the pen to the drawing…and then I just went on drawing! Then I set it on my table and moved back a few paces. Any artist would know that this was the time of reckoning – especially for a pen & ink drawing. You see, you don’t make corrections in these drawings because you can’t. So I moved back and looked at the drawing and the dear dog smiled back at me through his silky beard!

So, the Dungeon of Sloth is a thing of past. The payback to Oprah is done, and everything is back to normal 🙂