Hi Everyone,

Welcome to my pastel pet portrait blog. My name is Nick Beall and i am a professional pet portrait artist. I specialise in pastel portraits of animals and am commissioned full time by clients worldwide. I am married to Melanie Phillips who is also a pet portrait artists specializing in Oils on canvas.

I felt it was time I got into the blogging scene and since i have a lovely and newly design website (curtsy of Melanie – thank you) i thought i should start to blog some of my work.

I don’t spend an awful lot of time on my computer, Melanie tends to do that side of thing, she runs the pet portrait forum, updates her own sites and does all my websites updates for me at the same time, so im pretty lucky – i get the gossip of whats happening in the pet portrait world and have my sites updated as well, you cant get better than that! She often helps out with my customer side of things too, she is great at emailing (slightly faster typer than me) and has a lovely rapour with clients, shes a natural at dealing with them. This is great for me as it leaves me more time to work at my easel.

We have every day tasks down to a fine art in the studio, which is a necessity in our line of work as painting and drawing takes many, many hours so to have things running smoothly is imperative. We each have our own tasks and things work faster this way. I tend to sort out the ordering of materials, organizing the running of the studio and i do all the cooking (painting and drawing is hungry work!). This enables Melanie to do all the computer work and also gives her time to paint as well. She specializes in oils so she spends a lot of time at her easel. We also have a menagerie of pets to look after as well so they keep us on our toes!

So i think this has given you a little run down of how things work in our studio, who we are and what we do. I hope that you enjoy my blog, we have 6 websites and 3 blogs between us, so there is plenty for you to do and see around here! Links to these can be found in the navigation.

Enjoy! Nick

Don’t hesitate to leave a comment and say hi!

Hi Everyone,

Here are photos of the progress of my latest pet portrait. it was painted on fine great professional quality canvas to the size of 20 x 16. As you can see i began by drawing out the basic outlines of the dog and blocking in the background colours. I use a large brush as it alows the paint to go on smoothly. I then start to block in the under colours of the dog itself. I always go slightly darker so that i can build up my layers of paint. Once this is dry i start in with the detail and the collar. I hope that you enjoy studying these stages and I will place a final scan on my showcase blog asap! Ill post when its online : )

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Hi Everyone,

Here is my most recent portrait completed and scanned, you may have been watching its progress on my website. It was a 20 x 16 oil on canvas and is for a client based in America and was a joy to paint. This is my third white dog within the last month, its funny how coincidences like this happen as sometimes i have quite a few labs in a row or wesites, and now three white dogs : )

I have now updated my website and im currently working on a beautiful black lab which i will post probably after the weekend!

Hi Everyone,

Well this is one of my favourite portraits i have completed recently. I started this little fella about 5 weeks ago, i drew him out and blocked him in and hes been sitting here waiting to be finished so i have been working on him on and off this week. Smudge is a 10 x 8 oil on canvas and was a real pleasure to paint. I have to say Spaniels are one of my favourite breeds to portray, their soulful eyes and curly soft coat are brilliant to tackle in oil on canvas, the perfect medium for them. I have also finished a cute little dog called Greedy which i will post soon!

Hope you enjoy this one, until next time!

Hi Everyone,

Well here are my latest two portraits, i have been working really hard lately, early mornings and a few late nights on my portraits as at the end of the month we are going on a two week holiday. We are staying in the UK so im able to have access to a computer and the Internet. This means i will be keeping up with my emails, clients and forum so i will still be in touch with everyone. I have got myself quite organized with everything in the studio although isn’t it always the way i have lots of appointments before we go as well, one of which is a three, one hour appointments for a work experience student to come and see what happens here in the studio and to get some guidance on her work. It will be interesting and i will of course update everyone of how it went.

So my latest completed portraits are these two beautiful American Eskimo dogs, one of which has sadly passed. As i mentioned on my work in progress blog, due to these portraits being for the same client i worked on them both together to keep the continuity regarding colour, size and placement between the two. I used my largest easel and place them both on one large backing board which allowed me to work on them side by side.

I hope that you enjoy viewing them, if you click on them you will see a larger version and i will be back with my next portraits soon as i have quite a few on the go at once at various stages.

Hello Everyone!
The work in progress of the American Eskimos pet portraits below are commissions from the same client, and they were painted on separate canvases in oils to the size of 16 x 12. Due to these portraits being for the same client i worked on them both together to keep the continuity regarding colour, size and placement between the two. I used my largest easel and place them both on one large backing board which allowed me to work on them side by side. These are the first stages of the portrait, as you can see i have drawn out the pet portraits and then with a large brush i paint in the background. I then block in the main areas of the dogs and blend these in with the background. I oftne kleave this stage to dry for a few days before continuing on with the detail. This allows me to work on other portraits and either get them to the same stage or work on the detail of others while these are drying. These are details form the final scans and below smaller images of the final scan. I will post some higher res images of the scans on my showcase blog and i will let everyone know when they are online! I hope that you enjoy viewing these portraits.