Sketch for Kitty’s Portrait

I was asked to create a painting as a gift to remember Kitty, a beloved tuxedo cat who is no longer with us. While I’ve painted quite a few cats, I’ve painted far more dogs, so I always find it interesting how different they are to paint. Hair texture, eyes and face structure are all entirely distinct from a dog’s.

My biggest challenge was that the photo I had to work from had areas that were entirely washed out so all the detail was missing. But when I have a rainbow bridge painting–because there can be no new photos, I do my best to fill in the missing information by research. So I ended up pulling lots of photos of other cats to make sure I would know the directions the fur grew on their chests and faces.