Tide Painting

<sub>Digital Painting of Tide, a California Sea Lion at Marineland.
Painted from scratch in Photoshop CS5, using a reference provided to me.
About 7 hours of work.

Dedicated to a good friend, starting a new adventure in life... all the best!

Please note that I don't have time to say "thank you" for every favourite, but I appreciate them all nonetheless! Thank you all for your support!!!</sub>

This was painted as a surprise for a friend, so I couldn't post it until I gave it to her! This is one of two paintings, meant to be displayed next to one another, of her two favourite animals
Companion can be found here:

I haven't painted many sea lions, so I wasn't sure how it was going to work out... my reference photo showed Tide's eye as being closed, so I had to make it up as I went. I am SO HAPPY with the results! I really like the texture, and the shiny bits in particular... and her nose area. I wasn't sure about the likeness, because I cannot ID any of the sea lions, but I've been told that it looks just like her (they were able to guess that it was her without knowing), which made my day!!!