Category Archives: Commissioned Art Work

Painting Out of Your Comfort Zone

Benefits of Painting Out of Your Comfort Zone

Are there benefits of painting out of your comfort zone, or should you just stick to the same subject matter that your accustomed to painting? True, most artists find a niche or genre in which they become known for. Jumping around from one diverse subject to another, doesn’t build a very cohesive body of work. Still, something can be said about pushing your limits.

This recently came about with a requested commission painting. My client, had six cats and the last had recently died. She wanted to remember them in a painting that contained a garden scene, a water feature and a few small details including a butterfly, a hummingbird and couple of other birds. This was no easy task for someone who is primarily a landscape artist. However, in accepting the challenge I realized a few things of which I’ll share.

New Experiences: By painting out of your comfort zone, you open yourself up to new opportunities, experiences and of course challenges that can help you expand your painting knowledge. My experience with this commission tested my knowledge on perspective and design. Plus I had to do a lot of research on plants and flowers.
Enhanced Creativity: When breaking away from the familiar, it forces your mind to become more adaptable and creative and keeps you engaged.
Skill Acquisition: Challenging subject matter can help you acquire new skills and helps you grow as an artist. No matter how long you’ve been painting.
Self-Discovery: While you might feel anxious about trying something new, which is natural, the rewards of going beyond your comfort zone can help you realize you can often succeed at doing more than what you thought.

Pushing My Limits

Here’s the commissioned painting. Below the image, is the process that lead to the final painting which was definitely pushing my limits and painting out of my comfort zone.

My client sent photos of her cats and of flowers she had in her own garden. However, that doesn’t make a painting. So, the first task was spending time searching images of cats in different poses and using the supplied photos of the actual cats to help with their markings. Also, research was required to identify the different types of plants, flowers, then coming up with a backyard setting.

Once all the reference material was gathered it was now time to sketch out ideas.

Getting Out of My Comfort Zone

In this sketch you can see a few notations of the cats names and where they would be placed. Although the fountain was nice it was bad composition. It pretty much dominated the whole scene. Plus, it was not a good focal area as it was too far to the right. So, it needed something that didn’t command as much attention. More research was on for other types of wall fountains. Ultimately one was found that was adjusted using other elements from others resources to make it “fit” into the painting. That change also required moving the cats around. Altering one thing can alter the whole. So, you can’t just arbitrarily move something without it effecting something else.

My client also provided details about some of her cats and that one of them liked drinking from fountains. So that had to be included. Another, was to be pawing at a butterfly. However, when you have any activity going on in your painting, your eye will go to that. So those two cats had to be together and near the water fountain.

So here was the revised sketch.

This image shows a few notations regarding the layout’s design. The arrangement follows some implied lines to lead the eye. The red dots indicated the locations for the cats and possible locations for the other little critters.

Next was finalizing the drawing on a prepared cradled panel using thinned paint.

Even at this stage, there were adjustments made while painting. Some included perspective adjustments and deciding what would be the final plants and flowers to include and which would compliment the scene without being distracting.

Again, here is the final painting. It was done under my Byron signature, which allows me to do other types of work that fall out of range of what I normally paint. My favorite part was painting the elephant ear plant! 🙂

So, if your someone who paints, try painting out of your comfort zone. When you do, you might be pleasantly surprised. By the way, my client loved the painting.

Trompe l’oeil Painted Doors

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For the first post of 2023 I thought I’d share a couple of unique and fun projects of Trompe l’oeil painted doors. If your unfamiliar with the term, trompe l’oiel is a French term used to describe a highly detailed painting meant to fool the eye. Variations on this concept have been used for interior and exterior murals with varying degrees of detail. Sometimes you don’t always have to go to the extreme in detail to dress up and provide a piece of art onto an otherwise plain flat utilitarian object.

Such was the case when contacted by a client to paint the illusion of a Dutch door onto a plain metal interior door that was the entrance to the living area of their “barndominium.” After taking a tour of their home and seeing the interior colors and gathering more info from them, an initial sketch was done and once approved work began. The following will show some progress shots.

First was the door as it originally stood before it was delivered to my studio.

The photograph of the door was printed out and I used it to draw my preliminary sketch and a color mock up to show the client. Once approved the work began.

First Phase

After the drawing was done, areas were masked off and then painted with latex interior house paint. The color was a close match to other existing colors in my clients home. Once dry, blue painters tape was applied to mask off the already painted area, which made it easier to paint the background.

Second Phase of the tromp l’oiel door

Once the background was painted in, the painters tape was removed. The tape had also been put over the bluejay bird on the ledge of the door. An exacto knife was used to cut around the shape. Invariably a little paint seeped under areas of the tape requiring some touch up. Now with the tape removed the bluejay was painted.

The rest of the door was painted sitting on the floor.

Here’s the completed door which included my clients Shar-Pei dog Hazel sitting at the base.

Tromp l’oiel painted Dutch Door Installed

And here’s the door installed!

This was a new experience in painting and it was sooo much fun to do!

The fun continued with another painted door project for another client with a slightly even more challenging subject.

Another painted door!

The work process was similar to the above, however, oil paint was used in areas that needed more open time making it easier to blend colors. However, the door had texture and panels so a sheet of smooth plywood was attached and then primed prior to painting. The subject was my client’s daughter who had done some modeling and his English bulldog PaPa when still a pup sitting at the base.

So what do you think?

Completing a Mural

Getting the Ground Covered

Sky Work

Detail Work and Finish

This was a fun project and quite different than working at the easel. Plus working with acrylics and acrylic mural paint rather than oils was also different and using Styrofoam plates as palettes!

Here’s some still shots of the mural. Click the images for a larger view. So what do you think?

Oil Painting Commission of Boynton Pass

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Recently I was able to experience a change of subject matter from my Texas themed works for an oil painting commission of Boynton Pass, a location near Sedona, Arizona.

The following photo was provided for inspiration. However, there were a couple of requests, including a canvas size of 30×46 and then removing the highway and making more of a path and finally adding a century plant on the left.

Boynton, Pass near Sedona, Arizona

The end result is the “Majestic Red Rocks of Boynton Pass.”

Boynton Pass Sedona Arizono landscape oil painting by William Hagerman

This was a fun painting to do and a nice diversion. My client was very well pleased and the painting will be featured in a special spot in his new home in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

If you have a special photo that you would liked to have painted, please contact me.

You can visit my Commissions Page for more info.