I thought I’d share some examples of the commission process! I don’t have a set process as it really varies based on the client and what they want. Here are a few different examples of ways it could work:
Example 1: True to the reference photo, with minimal changes
In these two examples, the client has a reference photo or image that they’d like me to paint, and I stay relatively true to the photo and make only minor artistic changes. This category is the most straightforward in terms of the planning stages. Usually there is minimal back and forth in terms of preliminary thumbnails. The main decisions involve size of the final painting and the exact crop of the image. I will send one or two “in progress photos” allowing for minor changes along the way but typically there aren’t huge edits needed.
Example 2: Combining reference photos, or making significant changes to the reference image
In this category of commissions, the client has a reference photo they’d like me to use, but they want major changes to it. For this particular painting, my friend wanted a more dramatic sunset in the background. This category of commissions requires a little bit more planning in the initial stages, but is still relatively straightforward. I didn’t make any preliminary thumbnails, but did send more in-progress photos to make sure I was capturing what they wanted.
Example 3: Creating an entirely new scene based on the client’s vision
This third example is a commission that was recently completed and the process was much more involved but very rewarding. For this painting, the client had a very specific imagined scene in her mind that she wanted me to recreate. Because I wanted to stay true to the image she had in her mind, we did a significant amount of preliminary planning in the thumbnail stages before moving to larger canvas. I also sent her in-progress photos for changes along the way — as you can see, we changed the configuration of the clouds slightly in the final image.