Commissioning a Cat Portrait
Cat Photos
The first step in the commissioning process is arranging your cat photos. We need to see a few photos that you have taken previously or that you take specifically for the portrait. The photos you choose and send really need to capture your cats character well. We work with one main photo for the pose purely so that we can guarantee to capture 'your' cats personality, character and likeness - not just any cat - but your cat.
We like to work from one main photo for the pose, we are unable to look at a range of pet photos and make a pose up. We can however change minor things, for instance, have a look at the photo and painting of Soda below. The position of the Soda's tail needed to be curved around her and this was fairly easy to change as the client supplied us with two photos, one for the main pose and one with Soda's tail in the correct position.
Taking and sending us high quality photos is imperative. We are unfortunately unable to accept mobile phone photos as they are not really geared for showing enough detail fro us to work from. A digital camera photo is always best and if you need any help taking photos please email us and we will help in any way we can. Photos can be emailed to us in as high resolution, or you can send them to us on cd. If you have non digital pet photos you can either scan them or send us copies of them, please contact us for our studio address. |
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The Cat Portrait Mockup
Once we have received your photos we will create you a mockup of how your cat portrait could look. This can entail removing backgrounds, adding a different background if requested, adding two or more cats together in one portrait, making sure the size relationship is correct between them etc.
Our job is to create a lifelike painting of your cat. we can also paint or draw your cat in the setting of your choice. So before we put pencil to paper or brush to canvas we create a mockup so that you can see what the portrait could look like. This makes sure that we get the composition correct before any artwork is started.
The mockup is created in the computer and we will email this to you for your approval and if you would like any changes made you can let us know.
The example left shows Soda's mockup. The photo of Soda was taken indoors so this wasn't a suitable background for the portrait. The client requested a plain background and we knew that we needed a ground plain for Soda to sit on, so we created a few different mockups for the client to view and we settled on the desing left. Mockups are only a guide before the actual painting starts. |
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Painting backgrounds can be a very organic process.As you can see Nick slightly changed the colours of the background from the mockup, as he felt these hints of gold's and greens would work with with Sodas colouring. Everything has to be taken into account and backgrounds are almost as important as the subject. |
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Cat Portraits Payment
Once we have arranged the mockup with you, payment can be made on our website, you can either pay in full or a deposit. (overseas customers pay the remainder at that days currency exchange rate converted from sterling). Clients can also have their cat portrait framed with us, if you would like more information about our cat portraits framing service, please visit our framing section.
    
  
Order online or call us on 07855 582109. If you are outside the UK please call us on +44(0)7855 582109
Both Nick and myself usually work to around about a 6 week timetable for drawings and a 14 week timetable for the Oil paintings. We work on a first come first served basis, so if you are looking to have a painting or drawing fro a specific date, please let us know as soon as possible. We provide gift certificates and gift cards for those who would like to give a portrait as a gift for a special date if we are unable to meet your deadline. Click here to read more about our gift certificates and gift cards >> |
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Cat Portraits in Progress
Once payment is made you will be added to our client list on our 'portraits in progress' blog. You will see our current list of commissions on the left hand side of the blog and as each portrait is completed clients can watch their name rise up the list.
The Final Scan of your Cat Portraits
Once the cat portrait is complete we will take a scan or photograph of the portrait and email it to you for approval. If you would like any changes to your pet art at this stage you are more than welcome to let us know and we will make any alterations necessary.
Framing Your Cat Portrait
If you have ordered a frame with your cat portrait we take your portrait to our local framer to be framed. This usually takes about a week and we will take photos of your portrait framed in our studio for you to see and to add to our website.
Cat Portrait Delivery
Our cat portraits are sent via Parcel Force 24hr, or Global Priority for overseas portraits.Our Portraits are well looked after on the journey and we can usually deliver within 3 to 5 days worldwide. |
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If you would like to read more about our cat portrait commissioning process, we have a more in depth series of pages on our main pet portraits website which include a medium guide giving details on our custom painting services, traditional methods, showing our traditional painting methods, How It Works! - following a commission from start to finish, photography tips with our rescue dog Tom as the model for the photos, and a general pet art frequently asked questions page. We also offer a full Pet Portraits Gift Voucher Service too!
Don't hesitate to contact us at any time and we look forward to seeing your cat photos soon so we can create your very own custom painting! |
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