I’ve just completed Stacie and Foo Foo (aka A Girl and Her Bunny) – what a sweet portrait this turned out to be, with the bunny love and the feelings I get when I look at this precious moment!

Of course I gave my own Dusty bunny some love while I painted, too, and she also helped as a reference when I painted Foo Foo’s nose. It’s always good to have a live model on hand. (Need to remember this for future paintings of loveable furry things that I do not have in my family yet.)

It’s been a while since I painted a person in oils, and funny thing – I used the exact palette I always use. Natural skin tones can be achieved with just five colors – yellow ochre, magenta, white and sap green for the majority and the deepest shadows, lashes & brows were done using raw umber tinted with magenta. I’ll be painting a couple more humans here in the next few weeks, so I’ll get plenty more skin time very soon!

Enjoy, and have a great weekend! I hope you’re healthy and keeping your snouts and hooves clean!

(snort, snort… swine flu… get it? We’ve got it!)