For discerning pet owners who want more than a novelty print

AI apps generate novelty images from templates — they don't know your dog. My portraits are completely custom, built around who your pet actually is. After 20+ years as a professional portrait photographer, I know how to listen. Some dogs are ball-obsessed athletes; others are champion couch potatoes. I love placing your pet in an environment that's meaningful to you — the lake where you spend summers, colors that belong in your home.

My own dog George hangs above our fireplace in a winter scene at our cottage lake, painted in the exact palette of our living room. That's not something an app can do in 30 seconds.

Traditional oil painters work from a blank canvas — and occasionally, something just looks a little off. The likeness doesn't quite land, and it doesn't feel like them. My mixed-media process solves that.

I begin digitally, building the portrait layer by layer from your photos, then print it on canvas and hand-apply oil paint and texture where it matters most — the highlights, the depth, the details that make it breathe. The result: a guaranteed likeness and a finished piece that is genuinely fine art — not a print, not a filter, not a digital file. Both.

You're getting 20+ years of taste, vision, and craft — a photographer's eye for light and likeness, combined with a painter's hand. But honestly, clients say it best: a portrait becomes more valuable every year.

When a pet is living, it captures exactly who they are right now. Once they're gone, it's irreplaceable. It becomes the thing you reach for first.

Yes — and it's some of the most meaningful work I do. Many clients come to me after a loss, and I understand how tender that moment is. We move gently, at your pace.

Once the portrait is finished, the response is always the same: that presence is back in the home. That animal they loved is on the wall again. It's not a replacement — it's a way of keeping them close.

Most portraits are completed in 4 to 6 weeks. We begin with a conversation about how you want the portrait to look and feel — the environment, the mood, the colors. Once you provide photos (or I photograph your pet if you're local to Midland), I build the composition and you approve the proof before any final painting begins. No surprises.

The better the photo, the better I can nail the likeness — but I work with what you have. For living pets, sharp focus and good natural light are most helpful. For memorial portraits, a close-up of the face and a few different angles of the body give me the most to work with.

I also offer a free guide on how to take better pet photos — comment PAWS on any Instagram post to have it sent straight to your DMs. And if you're local to Midland, Michigan, I can photograph your pet myself.

Yes — portraits are commissioned by clients across the U.S. and internationally. Every piece is carefully packed to arrive exactly the way it left the studio: beautifully.

Portraits range from $1,800 to $8,000+, depending on size, complexity, and the detail of the environment. (An open ocean and a meadow of grasses are very different paintings.)

We'll discuss your vision and I'll give you a clear quote before anything begins. Most clients find the investment easy to understand once they see what they're getting — a one-of-a-kind piece of fine art that means something.

Once the portrait is printed on canvas, I add oils and texture by hand — working the highlights, building depth, and bringing forward the details that make it feel alive. Warmth and dimension that a flat print simply cannot replicate.

You can see where the paint catches the light. You can feel the texture. It's not digital art that happens to live on canvas. It's a painting.

Yes — and this is where 20 years of photography experience really shows. Better photos produce the sharpest likeness, but I know how to work with what exists.

More importantly: you approve the proof before the final painting begins. You'll see the composition, the environment, the colors — and give the green light. There's no risk of ending up with something that doesn't feel right.