We have produced a number of painted brush-stroked images for canvas printing or other uses and wanted to demonstrate some of our work. This all began when I returned from Ireland with a beautiful photo of 4 cows staring at me from a field. I wanted to print this photo on a canvas but I wanted the canvas to have the look of a real painting.  I began with the photo in Photoshop and working with the base image and building up layer upon layer of painted brushstrokes to reproduce the original image as though it had been painted.  After arranging the printing of the canvas, I also added oil paints to build up the final product to give it not just the look of an original painted piece, but the feel too.

Check out some of the other projects I have completed for friends and clients alike.  But first, here are the cows:

The original photo

Building up the layers

The final electronic file - to be sent to the canvas printers

The final canvas, hung on our guest bedroom wall - one day this needs to be framed!

A memory-of-home canvas

This project was commissioned by a real estate agent who had successfully helped her clients find their new dream home.  However, the family children were going to be sad to leave their old home, filled with so many good memories.  Taking a photo from my client, I added some “fun” elements for each of the 2 children and then did my thing with the brushstrokes, layering up a Photoshop file to get that desired finished look.

From Dawn, the estate agent:

They both were almost speechless when I gave it to them they were so surprised.

From the new house owners who received the canvas:

Thank you again for your gift. That was one of the most thoughtful gifts I have ever received. Seriously, it was really touching.

original photo of the older house

The final version

A memorial canvas for a much loved father

My best friend recently suffered the loss of her father.  At her memorial event, for his next birthday, she was proud to be able to present a painted canvas I had created for her, using one of the few photos we had of him, from her graduation a few years earlier.  I removed other people from the photo (in the background, as is normal at a busy event) and began taking a quite low-resolution image and developing a soft brushed painting with his name and dates added for the memorial.  The hardest part here was the “painting” of the eyes – in such an important painting, I was very intent on making sure his eyes had the exact kind, proud and fond look he had at the time the photo was taken.

My friend was broken apart by the painting, so thrilled and so emotional about what it meant all at once.  The canvas may not be hanging on her wall for a while, but I know when it does, she will remember her father on that great day with such love.

Cropped image with onlookers removed

Final image, ready to be printed and presented

A fun painted canvas from a vacation photo

It was my own family who requested this painting.  We had returned from visiting England and spending a great time with my family over there, who we see so rarely.  The ice we stand on is covering a pond my family dug out in the summer months for their commercial fishery, Redwood Park, in York, England. While snow is pretty common in December, ice on water so strong you can stand on it is not a normal phenomena making this photograph a favorite with all the family.

My husband, sock monkey and I at the family business in England

Pet Painted Canvases are a Favorite

Smokey, beloved cat of Susan in sunny Florida, suffered the loss of his tail a couple of years ago.  When visiting Susan and her cat, we staged some photos of Smokey that showed his round tail-less rump but also his lovely, charismatic face.  In photoshop, I removed the background of stored goods, a trash can and cat food supplies, to focus on this amazing chap.  I used a soft brush to follow the contours of Smokey’s twisted body, making sure all the fur details were maintained, as well as the lighting cast on his smoke-colored body.  Finally, I added a rich painted red background and perched him on a bench, looking affectionately back at people who stop to look at him.

His owner, a whimsical character in the Apalachicola region of North Florida, has since commissioned a local taxidermist to stuff the saved tail and attach it to the canvas, making it our first multi-media painted canvas project.  Photos of the end product to come!

Smokey posing for his work of art

Work in Progress of Smokey, creating his fur

Final Painted Canvas of Smokey the Cat

Our Own Beloved Spaz – a now 16 year old English Setter

I have been experimented with painting in Photoshop to take a regular old photo and give it that artist-worked-on look and appeal.  Fortunately I have many photos of my lovely English Setter to work on.  Below are a couple of past projects I developed of him.  These were never printed, but he is proud to display them on his Facebook page, along with a charcoal sketch an artist friend, Margaret Allstrom, drew of him.

Happy Spaz - enjoying a beautiful Day

Spaz running through the park in his younger days