2006 Pet Photo Competition 2nd Prize Winner

Second prize for the 2006 Yee-Haa! Artistry Pet Photo Competition went to Patty H of Michigan, USA for the beautiful photograph of her K9 Madison....

CONGRATULATIONS PATTY!!!

The independent panel of four appointed by Yee-Haa! Artistry judged the entry of Madison to be placed as the second prize winner!

Patty, you will receive an original graphite pencil pet portrait of Madison as the prize for your second place entry. 

STAGE 1

Wouldn't you know it....I forgot to take a photograph when I had the outline down on paper.  Here you can see half of the outline, and we all know what an outline looks like anyway.  I have started using a mixture of 2H, HB and B graphite pencils to get down the first layers of this pet portrait.  A fair degree of smudging is used to get the pencils to blend and create a soft texture.

STAGE 2

Pretty much the same as in stage 1, but working on filling in the other 1/2 of the face.

STAGE 3

At stage three I am mostly working with HB and B pencils.  As you can see the darker areas are becoming more defined.  I have also started to create a more definite outline of the eyes.  The darker area of Madison's head against the tiles has not yet been blended.  You will see this area nicely blended in at stage 4.

STAGE 4

Nearly there! At stage 4 areas of the drawing have been brought back to the base colour of the paper by the use of a hard, sharp edged eraser.  This is used to create the illusion of the texture of highlighted, longer hairs.  The eyes, including reflections, have now been included.  At this stage the pet portrait is near completion.

FINALISED PET PORTRAIT!!

And finally the finished pet portrait of Madison!  To reach the final stage there is a touch up here and there, including darkening some areas and lightening of others, a smudge here and a sharpen there, and the addition of the grout of the tiles that Madison is lying on and a small amount of shadowing on the tiles.  Sorry Patty, but I did not include the small patterns on your tiles as it would have distracted the eye from Madison....artist's liberty and all....hope you do not mind (but I did remember to remove her eye booger!!)    :o)

Congratulations once again on your winning entry! 

Oh, and do not forget that I will be running another Pet Photo Competition again in 2007, so do not forget to get 'snap happy' and submit another photograph!!

Kind regards,

Leanne