So here are the latest batch of portraits.  I really enjoyed working on all these.  I will spare you a lot of the details of the approaches to each one and just mention briefly who each portrait is of.

This is Annie.  She is the art star behind this Etsy store.  I really like her work and personal style. Check her stuff out. She also has a great blog called Ultra Vroom, that I subscribed to before I ever knew she existed, just because I dug her style. Thanks Annie.

This is Nicole.  Many of you are familiar with Nicole if you read our blog as she basically handed us a lot of readers from her blog.  We thank you for that Nicole, and I hope you enjoy being immortalized by another of your business partners. (this is Alma’s take….it’s tiny but you get the idea)

This is a couple I have never met before named Allen and Shelly.  They recently celebrated their 20th wedding anniversary and this portrait was given to them as a gift.  I was told they quite liked it.  I found this one the trickiest because they are now 20 years older than what was depicted in the image I worked from, but I tried to ignore that and focus on them as a couple in general.  I was also told to include the number 20 somehow, so hopefully you can see how that was done.  It was nice to do another portrait of a married couple.  Congratulations to Allen and Shelly.

This is Mari, whom I also have never met, (are you getting the picture I am not just doing portraits of friends?)  Well, Mari is now a friend after all the correspondence we took part in, as I did this portrait for her upcoming featured seller interview that will be on the front page of etsy.com next week.  Which I think is kinda huge, and exciting.  Here is her store link.  I also commissioned work from her, as she made me a custom Moleskine-style herringbone iPad case and a matching perfectly minimalist herringbone iPad bags, so that like Alma, I can have an excuse to have my iPad with me at all times, and yes, that now means I am the proud owner of a man purse, or murse if you like.  Anywyay, she did an amazing job.  Thanks again Mari!

…and last but certainly not least, a portrait of my dear Alma, who is currently in NYC at BlogHer.  We decided to make a promotional card to get the word out about our little idea here.  We talked it over and realized it would be funny to illustrate the idea for those potentially interested by having the person handing you the card, have their portrait on the card itself.  The card says something about these portraits being great for “about me” sections instead of a photo, or also as a engagement announcement picture, or just as a gift in general.  Here’s hoping she meets Julia Roberts there or something.

{Mike}