Fixed Fox

Smashed With Four Aces is one of my old paintings that I still love. Sure it’s a cliche idea but I so enjoyed weaving a lot of easter eggs into the artwork, referencing both the original series of paintings by CM Coolidge and of course, the various titles that the dogs appear from. You can read all about the process of creating this art in an old blog post.

One of the common critiques about the artwork was about Fox’s face. When I’d just completed the artwork I had trouble seeing it, then, over time the issues became really obvious but I didn’t find the time to address them. In some ways I was just so exhausted by the painting still (and the fact that my computer chugged whenever I opened the massive file). Mostly the problems emerged because I drafted Fox’s face after his Melee model, then swapped to his Brawl/Smash 4 partway through, trying hard to hew to the small snout, which didn’t really translate well.

Now that I’ve decided to do a new print run of these posters I’ve been able to find time to fix up Fox’s face. Matching up to the colour sensibilities I had when I first painted this picture was difficult. It’s not perfect but I think it’ll do for now.