Stolen Smiles

My clients seem to think that I have a magic keyboard with unlimited possibility. The reality is some of the things they request are a little hard to deliver, but I do love a challenge. Tracy's dad wanted her to have an open mouth smile, however he was totally unable to provide me with any photos of her smiling. I can totally relate to this, once that camera comes out even the happiest dog on the planet can freeze up. So I decided to look through my files and borrow or steal a smile from another pup. I teased my client and said that if I could pull this off I would be discussing his project in the blog. So here is what I came up with, and is it Tracy's smile? I dunno, but without a photo of her smile this is the best I can do, and I think it is not too shabby. Tracy is the Wheaten terrier on the left.


So who's smile did I steal? I took Murph the Westie's mouth (below). I rotated, shortened and warped his tongue a bit so that it would look more natural on Tracy. Using my stylus I painted in new hair around her mouth to blend better and got rid of some of the green color that did not match from Murph's image. There was no smile button on my keyboard or smile "filter" in photoshop, so I sort of had to know what I was doing. I could not have done this 8 years ago when I started my business. My crazy clients push me to learn more and expand my skills, and I really get excited when I try something new like this.