Kathy Press - - Life magazine !!

Please check out the Life magazine insert in your local newspaper!!

Please make sure to NOT throw away that Life maggie in your local paper on Thursday, Friday or Saturday of this week!! There is an article called "14 Things To Do With Your Dog", and commissioning one of my pet portraits is #11!!! How cool! How AWESOME!! My mom called me at work and told me the good news this afternoon. Really cut into my concentration level... but I recovered. :)

Please check which newspaper in your area carries the Life magazine, and check it out, if you are so inclined! How exciting!!!

Now back to your regularly scheduled programming...

"Lucky 7" Referral Program

I am instituting a new referral program. This is pretty much the soft launch. I've been planning to put together a postcard mailing campaign to send to all of my past clients, but I have not done it as of yet, and I keep collecting more and more clients who fall into the 'past' tense...and, well, for now I will just loud-speaker it here for all to enjoy!! :)

"Lucky 7" Pet Portrait Referral Program

It goes like this...

If one of my clients racks up 7 portraits to their credit through any of the following:

-Their own purchase
-A friend's purchase whom they referred
-The purchase of a gift certificate

they will receive one of my 6x6 sized original pet portraits for FREE (150. value)!

The fine print:

-The referral is only good for 7 PORTRAIT referrals, not 7 PET referrals - - so if you refer a freind who gets two 2-pet portraits, that only counts as 2 towards your goal, not 4.

-The Lucky 7th portrait must be redeemed within 6 months. This means: from the time of your being granted the Lucky 7th portrait, you will need sign up for your free portrait by getting on my Portrait Wait List. Your portrait will not necessarily be completed in six months' time. For instance, if you redeem your Lucky 7th portrait four months' after you receive the honor by contacting me to sign in and getting placed on the waiting list at that point, I may still have a three-month waiting list at that point, and would not get to your Lucky 7th Portrait until 7 month's after you received the Lucky 7th Portrait honor.

Enjoy!!!!

(Please note: This post has been edited for clarity, for typos, and to add pretty colors to selected type)

New Ink! Katieville...

Here is Katie! She is a beauty and very cute kitty. We came up with an old-fashioned postcard theme! The paint will be muted colorful tones - kind of like colorized old movies, but better! :) Here is the ink drawing. I'll be painting it in very soon.

Detail of Katie's face. Note the Swiffers in the landscape, keeping the palm trees company.

Detail of the lower left portrait. Note Katie's ball disc toy in the left side
background behind her (along with more Swiffers, which she also likes).

Bottom right of the portrait detail. See her favorite ball hidden in the right bottom
corner. Also note her scratching post is behind her, beside a palm tree!

Bunny & Martha!

Bunny & Martha are complete! I am so pleased with this portrait-the colors, the dogs, I just love it. I am so thrilled that B&M's mom is so thrilled with it as well. It is a great homage to these two lovely doggies which captures each doggies' unique beauty, personality, as well as their relationship dynamic. :)


Other new developments...

New Cafe Press stores:
Suki the American Eskimo
Charissa the Border Collie
Pinkie the Chihuahua
Molly Abigail the German Short-haired Pointer

New Case Studies:
Suki the American Eskimo
Charissa the Border Collie
Pinkie the Chihuahua
Molly Abigail the German Short-haired Pointer

Suki in Harvard Yard

Suki is an American Eskimo doggie. This portrait shows Suki in one of his favorite environments: Harvard Yard, where he often goes for walks. Since I live in Cambridge, I was able to meet Suki in person for this portrait - which was such a treat! Suki is a beautiful doggie and it was so great to do his portrait. His fur is very full, and very creamy white. I used many different shades of cream for his fur in the portrait. I tried to work the depth and texture using shadows. I was also able to take some detailed photographs inside of Harvard Yard to get the colors and the whole mood just right.

Portrait of Suki © 2006 Kathy Weller

In case you missed the doggie show...

Check out the Boston.com photo gallery rundown of the night.

Also on Westminster's site, vid clips of all the judging is available.

Because WE LOVE the dogs...

Who's watching the dog show tonight??

Last night and tonight, Westminster Kennel Club's Doggie show is ON!
USA, 8 - 11 pm. Set your DVR!!!


Doggie LOVE Story for Valentine's Day 2006

Your dog may help you click with others
Can Fido can help you meet that special someone?
(Of COURSE!!!!! :) We already know that though don't we :) )

~
: *
~

Molly Abigail

Molly Abigail © 2006 Kathy Weller

Molly Abigail is a doggie whose portrait I've just completed and sent off to her mom. I really enjoyed doing her portrait a lot. As I mentioned in a previous post, her mom was going for a certain mood in MA's portrait- a magical, twilight, foggy-mist-over-the-lake type of mood and we were both thrilled with the results!! :)

Here is the finished portrait along with some details. It's tough to show all of the detail in the portrait through one 425 pixel width, 72 ppi jpg, so here are a few other detailed shots. Not complete by any means but helps to give an idea of the level of detail in the portrait.

Molly is known as the "Treat Aficionado". The border is dotted with some of her favorite treats: greenies and doggie biscuits, as well as a couple of harmonicas, because she enjoys harmonica music.

Here is a detail of Molly Abigail's paw with her favorite toys-her blue Hurley bone and black Kong toy as well as another doggie biscuit. A ladybug and and some wildflowers hang out, too.

A butterfly sits on Molly A's paw. Molly A is also lying on her favorite real-life blanket.
A detail of Molly A's name banner, and also of the sky dotted with stars and moon.

The background features a misty lake and mountains. A Weeping Willow tree sits on each side.
Molly is a German shorthaired Pointer and has a beautiful coat with some auburn and white mottling
which was a fun and challenging texture to create for her coat.

Fun Friday Pet Tip

I want to mention Animal Planet's Puppy Bowl II (which aired last weekend opposite the Super Bowl) as a good TV program to keep the doggies content while you're doing whatever business at home that you need to take care of. It was obviously created to be watched during commercial breaks because it's basically just a bunch of cute puppies playing around and rough-housing in a football-inspired doggie play pen. My pug Ruby seemed to really enjoy the show (Daisy her sister was sleeping so I couldn't gauge her reaction, but she is the sardonic one and probably would have rolled her eyes at it anyway). I decided to Tivo it because after seeing Ruby's involvement, I thought it would be the perfect thing to keep her entertained during those times when we need a TV pug-sitter. :)

Irish Princesses

Bunny & Martha are all inked in! I'm really excited to begin painting them in.


(Edited to add:)

Notes on the Bunny & Martha portrait

-There are little clovers which dot the border on both sides.

-Left border sports a celtic design, right border has a nice tree with ivy design.

-The bottom scroll which sports Bunny & Martha's names is decorated with a harp.

-The top flag says Princess Bunny & Princess Martha.

-Bunny's collar also has a little flag on it which reads "St. Bunny", her nickname.

-Martha wears her kilt coat which is a shout out to her family's Scottish heritage.

-Both girls wear crowns; Martha's is based on the claddagh design and Bunny's is a more traditional crown design.

-There are two castles in the distance (presumably, one for each doggie to rule over, but close enough to have tea-time every day)

-The landscape is that of an Irish countryside

-The flowers n the landscape are indigenous to Ireland

What's cooler than...

Getting noticed by your peers? Feeling like a high-school girl getting asked to sit at the cool table (okay, so I never sat at the cool table, LOL), another pet portrait artist, Rebecca from Art Paw, wrote some really nice things about my pet portraiture in her blog the other day. It's just extremely flattering to be noticed in general, by peers, media and other pet industry folks, but not only has Art Paw has been around since 1998, but I like a pet portrait artist (or company) who has a specific specialty and does it the absolute best that they can, and that's Art Paw. So not just the artistic talent and focus required, but also the talent for business (and staying in it). So I really take it as a high compliment. Thanks, Rebecca.

Some pet stories to snack on

Dogs succeed in diagnosing cancer - The latest on this fascinating research.

A cut-to-the-chase animal doctor - A profile on Dr. Larry Hawk, president of the Angell Memorial (MSPCA) Pet Hospital here in Boston.

The latest issue of The Bark is out. I just love this maggie. In fact sometimes I wait to open it because once I start it's a total time-suck and I can't seem to put it down. It may seem trivial, but my favorite section is the Smiling Dogs section, which always makes me SO happy. Every time I check it out, it makes me so happy. Anyway I think that the new issue's content teases are not reflected on their site yet, in case you go there to check it out. But it is out. :)

Bunny & Martha

This week I drew Bunny (an almost 5.5 yr old Beagle) and Martha (a Boston Terrier, about a year old now), a couple of real cuties. I am really excited about their portrait for many reasons but I'll just share one right now. It's a lot of fun to be presented with a theme in which I can learn something new in some way, whether through the overriding theme, the dogs, the scenery, landscape or geographical location chosen - and this one provided a lot of opportunity for this type of learning. The theme is Ireland, with a shout-out to Scotland (Martha is wearing a kilt). The Ireland/Scotland theme is an homage to the doggies' parents' cultural identities.) The doggies are portrayed as Irish Princesses, and I got to do a little digging for flowers native to Ireland, irish ivy, landscapes, ornamental celtic designs, claddaugh symbol (this is used as one of the girl's tiaras). All in all, just a very fun and whimsical, yet also a very *classical* looking portrait which I look forward to continuing work on. And the dogs are just absolutely adorable!!! It's sometimes tricky posing two dogs but I have to say that I am very happy with the way this is coming. They are posed in a sort of classical-looking style, Bunny is standing and Martha is sitting - and, well, describing it might just be confusing and nothing else, so I'll just keep working on it and not attempt to describe it any longer. :)

The busy weekend past

This weekend, I did a lot of photo reference research for upcoming portraits. I also did some paperwork. The end of the year is here (or, rather, the beginning of a new one ;) ) and I did some number-crunching to see where I fell in terms of profit and loss, in my first full year of pet portraiting. It was a little sticky because I wasn't very organized last year. I thought I'd give myself one year to really see if this was something I wanted to continue, could continue, believed in enough to continue (ok, *my* believing in it wasn't exactly the issue, really - I had to see if *others* believed in it, too - that would be my clients). Well, now that I can't imagine NOT doing pet portraiture, I guess the answer to that is YES!

In the past few weeks I've done a LOT of legal work. It's amazing what a person can accomplish with a list and complete commitment. I'm also learning Quickbooks and populating it with all of my business information. It's quite a deep program! I have another appointment with my accountant in a couple of weeks to go over it some more.

Pinkie Fun

Pinkie's portrait is complete! Well, *almost* complete. :) I need to touch up her nail polish first to a nice bright pink! And, after that, her portrait will be shipped to her mom!! :)

Latest pet portrait news, Tues., Jan. 24

Got news!

My client (the one who seemed to be MIA) contacted me today! I am so happy, because I was a little concerned. She was fine, just away for a week. She really loves her portrait!! Which makes me so happy!! :) I love it, too! It's very moody and magical...with dragon flies, weeping willow trees in the background, a lake in the background, an outdoors, dusky, misty scene. And Molly is just a beautiful, regal doggie. I think she looks very wise. I absolutely loved doing this portrait.

It's such a great feeling to try to give the best of myself to each and every portrait. I try to channel the pet, in a way - I know that sounds totally hokey, but it's true! I look deep into their eyes in the photographs. I study them. I want to capture something special which is unique to their own individual spirit, and capture this feeling in the painting. It's this 'thing' which gives comfort to the pet's parents, when they gaze at their portrait time and time again.