So, where to begin? My wife called me a couple of months ago and in a round about way said she found a puppy that she wanted. We are big animal lovers in my family so even though we already had two dogs, it didn’t take much convincing to add another one to the pile.

One of my wife’s complaints is that none of the current animals we have seem to take to her like they do with me and the kids. One of the dogs in my house is literally my shadow and follows me wherever I go. I think this is the type of companionship that my wife was looking for so she put together a well devised plan to spoil the new puppy until it fell in love with her. Seems to be working since the new puppy has really taken to my wife. So, now my wife is happy and in my house when momma is happy, everyone is happy :-).

Now where am I going with all of this? I decided for one of the Mother’s Day gifts this year to give me wife a sculpture of her new puppy. It will be a surprise and one I think she will appreciate. I’ve done a few dog portraits in the past and they really do make a great gift. One of the commissioned portraits I did was for someone whose dog had recently passed away. I created the sculpture from several pictures that the client sent me and in the end she was more than pleased with the final results.

Ok, I’ve done enough rambling so lets get onto the tutorial. The nice thing about this tutorial is that I am going to show what I considered a completed piece of art. I am going to include the painting steps in the tutorial so that you can see the creation stages of my work from the beginning to the end.