http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif Thanks also John, gidget, Nikolai, Lilu and Soquili!

gidget -- Thanks! http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif
Lilu -- Your comments are so kind! I don't think I will ever feel I am a great painter, but I keep trying to improve. I like your works too!

Nikolai -- Hi and thanks for your kind comments! This new portrait was part of another one in which I took a dual portrait and created a single subject one through use of Photoshop techniques (this also answering part of Soquili's question) = I painted in more jacket and shirt and sleeve where there was none originally and matched it to the look of what was painted there on the canvas. For the background I wanted a more out of focus, softer effect, and there again, I used PS to simply soften the coloring.

Soquili -- Your encouraging words are most appreciated too! As I described to Nikolai above about this piece I used PS to enhance and create a single portrait...it was a great way to add more jacket and clothing details which weren't in the other picture before, and easy to do with the color picker and adding a bit of gaussian noise for texturing that fuzzy polartec cloth. The background I just softened much the same way using the blur setting to suit after marking/lasso around the area to be affected, add 3 pixel feathering then just the right amount of blurring filter. The missing background was made with just filling the background with a mid tone of one of the blues and painting in what needed to be matched. I also cropped the portrait and added a digital sig for posting. http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/smile.gif I can't consider myself a master at painting or with any digital media, but I manage to get the results I'm after so I'm happy. http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif
Thanks sooo much everyone!!! http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

---Maya