Paul & Jeri

The project came as early as Feb when my client, Paul, asked me to create a portrait illustration as a surprise anniversary gift to his clueless girlfriend, Jeri. He said that the celebration is in May and the project must be kept in secret. That means any WIP photo can’t be shared in public. *Sigh* haha. Game!

Paul mentioned that he wanted a similar execution like the “Hidden Garden” artwork gift that I did for my boyfriend last year. The brief was simple. The setting should be in a coffee shop, the mood must be relaxed and warm, and the characters ought to represent them and their little quirks.

Most of the pegs that Paul sent me are intimate portraits of lovers chilling on a coffee shop or on a resto. We talked about the preferred clothes and shared stuff concerning details as to how he imagine the whole thing should be, and the things I may worked around so that we both collaborated on bringing the artwork into life.

These are the initial drafts with Indoor and outdoor background, different postures and atmosphere. I also added extra details that was extracted from their photos, like for instance the patterns that Paul have in his t-shirt, and a specific style of clothes that Jeri don on one of her travels. In this way the artwork can be more personal for my client, and my job as a story teller will be more fulfilling.

Here, making lines and textures for the cardigan wool. This is Jeri, btw. She is basically a bookworm, so a book and a coffee in hand are very appropriate. Incidentally, I notice in her photos that she always wear her voluminous hair sideways like this. She looks very cute.

I have this little problem whenever I’m making a very dark shade with graphite, the tendency is to produce this silver surface, which isn't very appealing, so I try to blend it up with damp powder graphite and it helped a little to stay in matte.