Fran

 My long time friend asked me to paint a portrait of her mother who passed when my friend was quite young. To say the very least, it was difficult working from a blown up image that was originally a 2 inch polaroid photo. Even the color of the photo was quite faded. I did a rough sketch to get the "gist" of her face and sent a snap of that to my friend so she could see my progress and tell my anything necessary that I was missing. The day I sent it was the anniversary of her mother's passing! I had goosebumps!
So, on to the rest of it. I scanned it onto my computer and enlarged it, then used calipers to make sure I had the correct proportions as I sketched it directly onto the canvas with charcoal. I sealed that, then started painting. My friend asked me to frame it as she said she had no idea what she would choose so I went real traditional with gold, heavy and quite lovely. I'm pleased with the end result and very glad I had the opportunity to make my friend happy.