I have been approached to do a commission. My first commission.
it will be from a photo, a landscape type image.
We’ve agreed on a size and price, but having not done a commission or worked from a photo I am interested in any advice on how to go about it; what requirements for the photo image, do you show the work in progress? Do you do much editing? What do you do if they are not happy with the results, etc.?
Comments
Are they providing the photo? I would find that quite hard - I like to take a lot of different reference pictures with varying exposures / compositions and so on. I would try and go to the location personally to take some pictures if I were you (and if it's feasible).
@gar3thjon3s they are providing the photo. I won’t be able to go on site. I know I will have to crop it and make a few adjustments but it’s got a good resolution. The only thing is it seems to not have much atmospheric effect. It’s a Jeep parked off a dirt truck path in a large field with a bright clear blue sky and a single bird gliding above the field. The Jeep is an older four door red that has a nice sun burnt “patent” from being a California vehicle. Dry climate no rust.
If you need to make changes then maybe explain to them first why the changes to the photo would result in a better painting.
But if they were offering a really enticing price and insisted on an exact copy, even though it's an awful photo, and if I badly needed the money ... Well, maybe I'd do it anyway. But I might sign it with something that doesn't look like my usual signature so that I could disown it if there was a possibility of becoming successful as a result of later, really good paintings.
That probably sounds awful.
one thing that I wonder about is I usually wait a few months before varnishing. And the paintings look sunken because I use burnt umber. I wouldn’t want to send a painting until it is varnished. How do you deal with that kind of issue?
You still have to wait for it to be at least hard dry before using any kind of "retouch varnish" which is just any kind of normal varnish diluted with extra solvent.
You could use gamvar diluted with gamsol after it's hard dry if you really need it varnished soon.
Thankfully i can google search the image and get high resolution pics from nasa .
I sold total of three paintings before this to a souvenir shop and all three were of my choice of whatever i liked to paint .
I know its risky to paint a galaxy as a commision because it will always be compaired to a high resolution photos and tons of detail that cant be painted and if not done right it can easly look amature but i am happy with it so far plus anyway i always wanted to paint a galaxy at some point !
I always ask myself in the process is this a thing that i would like to hang on my walls and is this a thing that i would pay money for .
Very cool to paint a galaxy image. I love space related images. I’d very much like to see your painting when it’s done. if you would post it that would be great.
https://www.alamy.com/1959-ford-galaxie-image4343133.html?pv=1&stamp=2&imageid=C887CD8F-3E3C-42B5-9E29-0A5D512C706B&p=16117&n=0&orientation=0&pn=1&searchtype=0&IsFromSearch=1&srch=foo=bar&st=0&pn=1&ps=100&sortby=2&resultview=sortbyPopular&npgs=0&qt=ford%20galaxie&qt_raw=ford%20galaxie&lic=3&mr=0&pr=0&ot=0&creative=&ag=0&hc=0&pc=&blackwhite=&cutout=&tbar=1&et=0x000000000000000000000&vp=0&loc=0&imgt=0&dtfr=&dtto=&size=0xFF&archive=1&groupid=&pseudoid=&a=&cdid=&cdsrt=&name=&qn=&apalib=&apalic=&lightbox=&gname=>ype=&xstx=0&simid=&saveQry=&editorial=1&nu=&t=&edoptin=&customgeoip=&cap=1&cbstore=1&vd=0&lb=&fi=2&edrf=&ispremium=1&flip=0&pl=