
ACEO Lockkeeper Portrait
3-1/2″ by 2-1/2″
Rising Stonehenge Drawing Paper, White
This post begins a new project, an ACEO sized portrait in colored pencil. Some of you will recognize this project, which was first published in 2008. Because most of my current studio work is either portrait work or demos for art articles (neither of which I’m at liberty to post about), I thought I’d revisit a favorite project.
Before we get started, a little information on ACEOs.
ACEO stands for Art Cards, Editions and Originals. These trading card-sized paintings are also often referred to as Art Trading Cards (ATCs). The primary difference is that ATCs are designed for swaps and are not technically sold. ACEOs can be traded, as well, but are also bought and sold.
An ACEO/ATC must be 3.5 inches by 2.5 inches. They can be created in any medium on any type of support. They can be originals or reproductions. They may be painted in any style and of any subject. Since 2007, I’ve used oils, colored pencils, pen and ink, and acrylics to paint landscape, abstract and equine-theme ACEOs.
Colored pencils are my favorite medium for these tiny paintings because they allow a high-degree of detail and the process is fairly quick, though an oil ACEO can be done in 20 minutes or less.
I also like the size because I can use scrap pieces of paper, canvas or other material to paint on and because I have no compunction at all about wiping a canvas or tossing a painting that doesn’t work. That makes them ideal for trying new materials, new mediums, new techniques, or new subjects.
My subject for this painting is the Standardbred stallion, Lockkeeper. His official portrait was delivered earlier this year. I’ve also painted a colored pencil version of the official portrait, an ACEO in oil of Lockkeeper, and a couple ACEOs: this colored pencil and an oil.
From the photograph above, I developed a drawing. The original drawing is larger than the ACEO size, but that’s not unusual. Most of my drawings are worked up at a set size, usually 8×10 to 9×12, since those sizes of drawing pads are easy to carry wherever I go and I can work on drawings away from the studio. This drawing isn’t that large, but it’s still larger than an ACEO.
The drawing had to be scanned and reduced to size for this project. It would have been nice to be able to print directly onto the drawing paper, but the card had already been cut to size and I could just imagine the mess that would cause in the printer.
So I coated the back with a graphite pencil, positioned the reduced drawing where I wanted it and retraced the lines to transfer the drawing. The soft lead I used required some clean up afterward, but that was all right. I got a nice, crisp drawing without making impressions on the paper. At this size, that’s a plus.

The beauty of colored pencil is that I don’t have to prepare surfaces, then wait for them to dry. I went to work immediately with the under painting using a Prismacolor Verithin in Dark Umber. I chose Verithin because that line of pencil has a thinner, harder lead. It covers paper well without filling the tooth.
The background will be a textured green ranging from a nice mid-tone to a fairly dark color. Although I can do landscapes this size, the purpose with this portrait is to have the background play a minor supporting role. At one point, I considered using a colored paper and leaving the background untouched, but chose a white paper, instead.
I also worked on Lockkeeper. I’ve learned the hard way that if I don’t carefully save the highlights, I tend to work right over them. Unlike oils, where lights can be painted over darks, it’s impossible to recover those nice, clean highlights once they’ve been worked into when using colored pencil.
So I am working the background loosely and working the horse carefully. At this point, though, it’s difficult to tell the difference!
By the way, this is a variation of the classical painting technique I use for oils.
