Painting Process: Christmas Commissions 2025
My first commissioned portrait of a dog
The busiest time of year for custom commissioned paintings is definitely the second half, mostly due to the biggest gift giving holiday of the year for most people. I am talking about Christmas of course. in 2025 I had two commissioned paintings for Christmas. One of a grandson for a grandma, and the other of a beloved pup for a spouse. In this post I will take you through step by step of what the process of collaboration and creation of a commissioned painting looks like, in two different scenarios.
The first question I inevitably get first is how much a commission costs. I honestly hate having to discuss this, as I think most creatives do, so I created an easy table with the sizes I commonly work in, an estimated turnaround time, and the approximate price. You can find that information as well as the request form to start the commission process here. Once the size is agreed upon, I next go into the sketching phase.
The first commission I started is of this very cute dog named Ekko! I was sent quite a few reference photos of the good boy and came up with thumbnails to send to my friend. You can see my initial ideas on the far left of this image.
Once the client chose which composition stood out to him the most, I created a more detailed sketch with the preferred composition. This is where I work out things like value and accuracy of drawing. This is especially helpful for when I paint a subject I am less familiar with, like dogs for example. I have not painted them very often in my career, and so sketching out the details as much as I need leads me to feel more confident when it comes time to put paint to canvas.
The next step is one that I actually skipped for this particular painting. It is a step that in more complex paintings I would definitely not skip, but I felt fairly confident in the colors, along with having good reference photos to work from that I decided I could go right into the final painting. That step is creating a color study. I usually do this on my iPad with a digital painting program called Procreate. I have also done it in oil or gouache or even marker if I am concerned about the complexity or need to work through difficult or made up lighting situations. But this particular painting didn’t seem like it was going to be too much of a challenge in that regard for me.
The next step I never took a picture of with this painting. But I will talk about it anyways! After final approval from the client for the compositional sketch, I transfer my drawing to the board I will be painting the final painting on. I usually pick a neutral paint color and just sketch it on with a paintbrush and by eye. There are other methods, such as using a projector, using a grid, or transfer paper. But honestly I am too eager and impatient to get to the color part so I just wing it and do it by eye (I am fairly confident in my ability to accurately draw the subject by hand, since I do it all the time. I used to use the methods mentioned above when I was less confident).
I took this image below when I thought it was finished. I sent it to my friend, he liked it. We were good to go! Or so I thought. I let it sit and dry, and the more I looked at it, the more I felt like something was of with the composition. Something was competing with Ekko in importance, at least to my eyes.
The tall tree in the background felt too sharp and the shape made it stick out too much. I wanted the landscape to be nice to look at, but I didn’t want it to compete with the dog for priority. So I took it out.
Once I was finally happy with the painting, all that was left was to let it dry, varnish, and ship it out. It didn’t quite make it in time for christmas due to longer than usual drying times for some reason. It was frustrating because it was an element I couldn’t control. And I definitely didn’t want to send a wet painting in the mail, for obvious reasons. But my friend was understanding and it made it there safely!
The final painting!
The next commission I want to mention is a very small, very quick one that actually was a breeze and a joy to make. The prompt and the reference acquired, I decided with a quick turnaround and a simple concept, I could skip all the steps and go straight into painting. Below is my first pass.
This first pass was just putting brush to board, quickly and fluidly, trying to get the colors, values, and drawing as accurate as possible. There are definitely some errors in the drawing, and some refining that needed to happen, but this first part had all the elements to be a good start.
I let the painting dry, then went back into the portrait with care and accuracy to fix the drawing, trying to get the likeness as much as possible. Since this was a small portrait, getting an accurate likeness was the most important element, and so focusing very carefully on the drawing and getting the shadow shapes correct was the best way to succeed.
This is the final painting. You can see I softened the edges and fixed the drawing. I added complexity to the colors in the face to give the illusion of depth and life. Making this 8 year old look like an 8 year old was a lot harder than I expected. As someone who is used to the proportion and structure of adult faces, I really had to slow down and finesse the drawing to make sure I was following the reference and not my own expectations.
I really love creating paintings that are gifts. I love being a part of the process of showing someone love! It is such a good feeling to get the feedback from the receiver of how they loved their painting, and I love being a key part in making them happy. There is nothing like showing someone you love them than by gifting them something as unique as a painting created just for them.
If you want to work with me to create a commission artwork, either for yourself or for someone you love, check out my commission page here. I look forward to working with you!