Hi Simon,
What a beautifully soft and relaxing piece. I

Linda - you found me out (although I actually used eight separate photos, not two).

The dog is a rat terrier which has stightly longer legs than a Jack Russell. The boy and dog are perched on a stone bench which I did not want to paint in the picture.

I've worked on the painting more this week and I think I'm ready to call it done: thanks to everyone's helpful comments it's a better realization of the picture I wanted to paint when I started working on it.

Simon

Very nicely done, Simon, and may I add my welcome to you as well.

You've accomplished a lot in this piece and you were wise to otain the resources you needed to produce such a challenging painting.

On my monitor it appears you toned down the values in the background which I think works well by creating more separation between it and the subject. If you're like me you've got butterflies on the delivery. You should be confident as this is a winner.

Simon, what an excellent solution! You have taken everyone's critiques, processed them with a generous degree of talent, expertise, and your own personal vision, and you have come up with a gem of a portrait. Congratulations!

Alex

Simon, this is indeed a lively and joyful portrait, I am sure your clients will be very happy with it! Many compliments to the brilliant solutions, I think the changes you have made were worthwhile
Hope to see more from you soon
Ilaria

Simon,

May I echo John, Alex, and Ilaria to say I believe you've found the perfect solution to a very successful, natural feeling, and emotionally warming portrait. Bravo! I look forward to seeing more of your works here. I love how you paused the dog.

Garth

Simon,
I agree with everybody, you have finished this vividly, yet relaxed scene in an elegant way. You are a pro :thumbsup:
Allan

My belated welcome as well! You've really done a great job integrating some very thoughtful ideas into such a challenging painting!

Congratulations,

I wanted to compliment you on my favorite part of this painting and that is the very colorful whites you have painted in the shadows of his shirt.

If you haven't delivered this painting yet, I would suggest one more area that, to me, needs a bit more attention, though. I think there needs to be more naturalism in the trees. They seem rather quickly drawn and more like "symbols of trees" rather than keenly observed shapes. I am glad you lightened them so they are less distracting, but the rest of the painting is so well put together that the trees take away from it, at leas to me.

Thank you to everyone.

Chris - I've read your book.

Michelle, I've seen your portfolio before while browsing this site and I really admire your work.

I painted the trees with just a few brushstrokes as I wanted to keep that area full of light and use it as a way to start a flow of light down through the rest of the picture. The setting was also carpeted with leaves and I wanted to find a balance between detail in the foreground subjects and background.

Simon