Shih Tzu Portrait in Oil 689

Painting portraits with oil paint means there is a lot of waiting for paint to dry. This is why I often work on more than one painting since there is no sense of sitting back idly while waiting. I started this little Shih Tzu a while back and had to wait for all that white paint to be completely dry before starting to layer thick impasto paint layers. It makes a world of difference when a painting goes from flat to something with tactile texture. What I like best about it is that depending on the way the light hits the paint, shadows are cast, so the whole painting takes on another 3rd dimension and makes the pet portrait look more lively than before. 

Here is a video I created on how I painted this Shih Tzu portrait

Here are some more detail shots where you can see the different colors that I have worked in. I like to add refelcted light from the surrounding areas, because it makes the figure belong more to the fictional enviroment that it has been placed in.

When you look at the painting at a glance you might not even notice all the pale pinks and yellows, blues and purples, but that's a thing that sets my paintings apart from many other artist's work. 

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