Painting Realistic Curly Fur
Hello Creatives, Lauren here with Lauren Elizabeth Animal Art and I help beginner through professional level artists reduce stress while mastering animal art. Continuing my Pet Portrait Commission series, today we’ll be focusing on technique were I’ll be showing you how to paint realistic curl dog or cat fur using acrylic paint.
I’m currently working on a two dog pet portrait of Teddy on the left and Baby on the right. Their fur is similar, but very different. Baby has tighter shorter curls, whereas Teddy has curls that are a bit straighter, longer, and more brown in color. This technique I’m about to go over is great for breeds with tight and loose curls such as your standard poodle, labradoodle, spanish water dogs, pumis, barbets, bichons, even selkirk rex cats.
Super Tight Curls
First dogs with tighter curls, as I’m demonstrating on the limbs of the right dog, Baby, I start by using the medium value first, not my darkest colors like I normally preach with acrylics. I use a medium gray that is lighter than the darkest greys in Baby’s coat, but darker than the highlights.
Using my #2 Arteza filbert brush with my medium grey I create short lines and dots placed closely together and going in all different directions. The lines are super short, and the dots look more like small blobs of all different shapes and sizes.
I still leave some white between these lines and shapes which is where I’ll later add my highlights, then my lowlights too. I’m not copying every curl I see in the reference photo, just taking color and shape clues.
Then once I’ve lay down a very generous layer of my medium values, that’s when I move to my light values. Not my lightest highlights, OK, but a shade or two darker. I can easily find this color by simply adding my lighter color into the mixture I was just suing for the first base layer. In this case I would just add white to create a light grey.
I’ll then work this light grey in between the medium grey values, especially in the areas facing the light source. Then once I think I’ve applied most if not all my lighter values (again not my lightest highlights) then I’ll move to my dark values. You can see with Baby I don’t have too many, but there are some around her belly in dark grey.
Now, curls will clump together and lay in different directions. It’s with my dark and light values that I focus on defining these different clumps of curls. I’ll use darker values to create curl separating and define the curl clumps, whereas I’ll use my lighter values to create curls that are raised up or exposed to more light.
It’s at the very end when I add my lightest lights and my darkest darks to really bring out those details and make it look more realistic. As you can see I tend to jump around alot. I’m constantly stepping back from my work to see where I can add that same color to another curl or clump of curls.
Looser Curls
Teddy, on the right, her fur has less bulky clumps. The fur is a bit looser laying, and so we have a bit more individual curls to define. Again I’ll start with my medium grey, with some added brown, in this case I’m using white, black, and burnt umber, with a tiny bit of raw sienna, and I’ll place down just lines, not dots as well. These a curled lines going in all different directions, and clustered closely together. Then I’ll go in with my lighter values between them, followed by my darker values. Then at the very end I’ll add my darkest darks and my lightest lights.
As you move closer to your lightest colors, I recommend switching to a smaller brush like a detail round brush, rigger brush, or liner brush, especially if you’re working with tighter curls or painting on a really small scale.
This process is time consuming, I’ll be honest. And you must be very intentional with each brush stroke. Take lots of information from your reference photos, seeing how those curls sit, how large or small they are, how fully they are, and their color in both the shadows and facing the light sources.
For Aspiring or Current Pet Portrait Artists
If you’d like to learn more about how to paint pets and/or get ahold of my NEW upcoming Pet Portrait Commission Course, checkout my Online Animal Art Masterclass linked below. That course will be ready on December 15th which includes the exact pet portrait commission contract template I use, the pricing formula I use, and my 10-step pet portrait commission process.
