My name is Dawn Hales.

I have always enjoyed drawing from a young age and everything I have learnt has been self taught and with each drawing that I complete, I learn a little more.

It was in 1992 that my hobby took a different direction. I found that I was spending too many hours at work and by the time I got home, getting out the pen and pad was a bit of a task. So, to ensure that at least one night a week I would finish work early, I enrolled in evening classes at my old school. It was here that I learnt to draw with a mapping pen and ink, but frustrated with blobs of ink from an overloaded pen ruining picture after picture, I bought a technical drawing pen. The pen I use is .13mm which is extremely fine. I use this for architectural drawings which need fine lines and detail, and sometimes for animals using a stippling (dot) effect which is gradually built up to produce a realistic drawing.

Shortly after the evening classes finished, I was commissioned by the company I worked for at the time to draw various construction projects they had built, which were then printed and produced as Christmas cards. I then started to get commissions from family and friends which ranged from pictures of pets to favourite landscapes and buildings using either graphite pencils or the technical pen.  And then I discovered Corel Painter and it was using this software that I started producing art in colour. It’s great knowing that if you make a mistake, edit/undo is so much better than starting all over again!

For all commissions, I always work from photographs and if I don’t take the photo myself, my only request is for as clear a picture as possible, preferably a good quality digital photograph with as much detail as you can get. Especially the eyes for portraits/pet portraits.

The finished work would be delivered to you unframed and any hard copy photographs returned. So, if you would like to treat yourself or give someone special a unique gift, please contact me using the link below.