I have had such a great time the last few months working on this watercolor commissioned piece! This is a painting that was a gift to the purchasers sister, and has really brought a lot of joy to my heart in spending time with these lovely ladies, even if it was just by staring at their picture.
I am excited to share this process with you, and to let you know that I am ready for the next one! I usually take on two at a time, and while I am still working on a huge portrait, I have time and energy for a second one! I generally like to have more than one thing going on in the studio. It keeps my brain fresh. Plus, some things are smaller and portable, while others are just worked on in the studio.
So where do we start with a commission? First, I am contacted by a client and they talk with me about what they would like. I put together several really rough sketches on my iPad. This ensures that I can work on it anywhere I take my iPad, and I feel like it is quicker to put the ideas down. Plus, it feels like less waste if I get the preliminaries down electronically vs. on sketch paper. I invested in the iPad Pro with the iPencil because it really is the closest to actually writing on paper that I could find, and the ability to copy and alter images allows me to try out different effects without loosing the “good” image that I want to apply the effect onto.
Now, when I am at this preliminary stage, I want to get feedback from the client, but I also want to ensure that they realize that I realize this is a really, really rough sketch. Like, embarrassingly awful images, but I have to get the ideas down. People don’t always understand my spoken descriptions. Rightfully so. Sometimes I don’t even understand the words that are coming out of my mouth when trying to explain something. Visual is way easier for me.
With this particular painting, there was a lot of back and forth, because the customer had some ideas of what she was wanting, and wanted to create a collage effect with adding in symbols to represent interests of herself and her sister. With the iPad, I was able to isolate these images, pick them up and move them around! Without using even more paper. We saved so many trees! Yay us!
Like I said, this was a really rough layout, but from here, she was able to ask me to tweak certain areas, make things more prominent, or eliminate other areas. We also talked about logistics, size, and what materials we would use. She chose 11x14in, and we chose watercolor because she liked the effect of the transparency.
We also discussed price, and I require 50% of the total price up front, to cover time, materials, etc. the final 50% is motivation to finish! It is also good to sign an memo of understanding with your client, and there are many websites out there that will give you ideas on how to write one up, including how to handle disagreements and alterations beyond reasonable changes.
And then it was just layer by layer of paint, and emailing images to the customer for feedback! This was such a fun process, and I hope you consider having a commissioned piece made for you, or if you are an artist, consider collaborating on something for your clientele!
I’m excited for the next project, and will post it right here!