Painting of roof with cats

I recently completed my biggest painting ever, 24” by 36” canvas with acrylic. I started out with a red canvas because I like how it can surround paintings to make them a little bolder (see some of my other paintings with a red background).

I picked out the starting picture - of a lone cat on a tiled roof in Jarandilla de la Vera, Spain. The original picture was taken by Fernando Nieto (check out his 500px, its great!).

I started out by sketching out the painting, loose white paint on red.

I also decided to add another cat into the mix, a great photo taken by Mathew Lorenceau (also has a great 500px account, check it out). You can see the sketched second cat in the top left, but it disappears when I start layering things.

Next I added in lots of colors, clouds, and spend a long time painting bricks. The tiles became quite tedious, and I didn’t like how much red was showing through.

I spent a long time filing in tiles.

I added the first cat.

Then I added the second cat.

Then I added some finalizing details - more highlights on the tiles and some more shading on the clouds. I’m pretty happy with the outcome!

If you have a picture that you’d like me to paint, leave a comment below.