Hand-painted photographs were tremendously popular in the early twentieth century, before the advent of color film. The most successful marketer in this area was the photographer Wallace Nutting, who employed 100 colorists and claimed to have sold over 100 million pictures. In the days before Kodachrome, parlors and sitting rooms everywhere displayed placid, pastoral landscapes produced by the small army of painters in Nutting’s employ.

Photo painting is once again becoming popular, but the market is still largely untapped. And just as in Nutting’s day, photographers are employing artists to turn their portraits into hand-painted works of art. My studio, A Work of Art, has been supplying photo painting services to photographers since 2004. I realize, however, that my style is not for everyone, and that’s why I’m happy to show the work of other artists here in the Magazine. Today I’m thrilled to share with you my recent interview with a wonderful digital artist, Heather Michelle Bjoershol.

Heather offers wholesale Painter services to professional photographers, who either do not have the time or desire to spend hours digitally hand-painting portraits for their clients. She is a Corel Painter Master and her paintings are very much in demand. Corel has displayed Heather’s work in some of its national print advertising.

Digital Image Magazine: Thanks, Heather, for taking time out of your busy schedule to talk with us. Please tell us a bit about yourself.

Heather Michelle Bjoershol: I grew up in a professional photography environment as my mother had a studio in the home. A formally trained painter and sculptor, she taught me how to see light and composition. From an early age I would go to all of her location sessions and had the very important job of holding the reflector. Growing up she’d let me experiment in any art form using the house as my canvas. Just about every room had a different mural or faux finish. I painted Monet waterlilies along a starcase, and a DaVinci watercolor sketch along the basement entertainment room wall. Unfortunately, one of my best achievements at that time was painted in a closet. I dabbled with abstract art and didn’t think it would turn out very well so, hesitant, I painted in the closet. I was the child who made food sculptures, tried to emulate Van Gogh with finger paints and always had a pencil handy to doodle on napkins. In high school, 35mm black and white photojournalism became my passion and I was priveledged to photograph alongside my mother for a few years. After high school I I had attended the Maryland Institute College of Art for a semester and found I learned better directly under artists so I went home to study under my mother, whom I worked for two years in post production, advertising, and painting images. The only classes I took were Helen Yancy’s Painter workshop and Don Emmerich’s Photoshop class at MARS. Every weekend you’d find me in Borders book store poring through the art books or surfing online for any tutorial I could get my hands on. The first two years were nothing but trial and error, and I finally started to get the hang of it. At that point I branched off and created Etherielle, Visions Interpreted, which is now renamed Heather The Painter.

DIM: Where did you learn Painter, who did you train with? Any books you found helpful?

HMB: Don Emmerich’s Photoshop class at MARS years ago. He took a few hours one day and showed us the very basics of Painter and I was immediately hooked. My two passions are photography and painting so working in Painter opened up an entire world of fusion for me. Two books in particular were pure gold: Cher Pendarvis’ Painter 8 WOW book [the latest version is The Painter X Wow! Book], and Painter X for Photographers: Creating Painterly Images Step by Step. A year after taking Emmerich’s class I enrolled in Helen Yancy’s week long workshop for Painter. She is such a wonderful teacher and that workshop tied up all the loose ends.

DIM: Tell us about your Painter services.

HMB: I offer wholesale painting, retouching, and design to photography studios. Over the last few years I’ve developed a reputation for retouching odd jobs that the labs typically don’t offer. On the Painter side, I offer several “interpretations” from watercolors to porcelain smooth oils, to heavy impressionistic paintings, to what I call “Interpretation X.” X is a wide gamut of styles, so its name never evolved. The “hair paintings” are considered X [see the gallery, below]. Photographers love using this interpretation with competition prints. A photographer can upload or mail a RAW image and I return a full resolution hand painted digital interpretation TIFF for them to print. Just this past year I’ve started to offer design services with logos, custom album and card design.

DIM: Do you offer training?

HMB: Absolutely. I offer one on one training within the area (will travel), as well as seminars here and there. I’ve been putting together a tutorial DVD but haven’t published it quite yet. It’ll cover the basics of getting set up even if you’ve never opened the program. A more advanced one is also in the works. Unfortunately, there never seems to be enough time to get them finished and published.

DIM: Tell us about how you became a Painter Master for Corel.

HMB: I’m a frequent visitor to the CG Society and noticed an ad for Painter entries for their latest publication. Since it was free, I entered several paintings. A month later I got an email notifying me that two had made the Painter book. Corel noticed the paintings and their rep contacted me shortly after to use images in their marketing for North America, and Europe. “Little Miss” was their main marketing image in the photography magazines. When Painter X was in the works, the same rep asked for a portfolio as they wanted to use some paintings in the program/manual. They chose four pieces (one is on the back cover of the program), and granted me the title “Corel Painter Master.” I am thrilled!

DIM: Any advice to someone wanting to learn Painter?

HMB: Have a lot of patience and learn brushology. If you don’t know how to work the brushes it doesn’t matter how accomplished an artist you are. John Derry has some amazing tutorials on www.lynda.com that dive into the confusing world of brushes. Also have some extra hard drives on hand and save everything while taking notes. Don’t be afraid of making (and saving) your own brushes. Keep at it, and you’re on your way to mastering Painter. It’s a phenomenal program!

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I’m very grateful to Heather for her time, and for sending the following gallery of images along. You can visit Heather at www.heatherthepainter.com.

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