Gypsy Vanner & Drum Stallions

This is a large 24x36" commission(priliminary photo to work from above) for a Gypsy& Drum Farm in Pennsylvania. First I went thru a few dozen photos of the individual stallions to get the best positions to make them appear as if they would standing together in the final composition keeping their'hands' in mind for their placement. Next I decided on the lighting and wind direction since their manes, feathers and tails are going to be a very important feature of the painting. I need them to be blowing to really accentuate each individual horse without taking away or seriously covering up their neighbors.

I started painting the actual background on the canvas and then took it into photoshop(took a picture of it and saved it) to apply the horses to figure out how they would go. This is the composition I came up with and drew in the estimation for their manes etc in photoshop before bringing it to canvas.

This is the actual painted background started. I need to add more leaves to the tree in the background still..Im not worrying about creating the tree to precise realism as it is only being done as a suggestion and to create a grounding for the horses..There will be another bush/tree to the left of Cobalt(the white horse) which will be more in focus and contain more detail..

Today I started drawing the 4 horses onto the canvas. It may be a bit hard to see the pencil lines..hope you can see it...

This is the two horses on the right, Guiness the Drum and Slainte the Gypsy. Hardest to pick out Slainte in these...

And this is the two horses on the left, the white one Cobalt on the end and the small black Tonka between him and Guinness. The hands difference between these two is incredible. Tonka is a mere 13.3 and Guinness a very large 17.1. When I originally placed little Tonka on the end, his wee size was too accentuated.

Well this is a start. Now off to get something small done for ebay today as my mermaid ends this evening. Need something to replace her...Been doing mainly mermaids & dolphins for ebay these past few months. Gotta do what sells there right? Ive missed doing the realism and the horses especially so this commission is a really nice treat...:)

Happy Tuesday all!!

And thanks for your interest!

Caron