Patrick LaMontagne  

Alberta-based artist Patrick LaMontagne received a compliment on his portrait of Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield from up on the International Space Station. "Thanks Patrick - what skill!" tweeted Hadfield.

Alberta-based artist Patrick LaMontagne received a compliment on his portrait of Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield from up on the International Space Station.

Hadfield, who is aboard the ISS on a five-month stay, was tagged in a mention on Twitter about a portrait of him and he wrote back.

"Thanks Patrick - what skill! I wish you could be up here to see and be inspired by what we can see," he said.

The Canadian Space Agency wrote to LaMontagne on Twitter saying, "Well done! Nice blog entry too!"

According to LaMontagne,

There is no better legacy than to inspire those around you and the next generation to believe in the possibilities before them. I can’t imagine how many children are now considering futures in the space program because of Hadfield’s example. Whether they’ll remain on the ground as part of the team that sends us further into space or actually get to be one of the few who go, will be up to them.

LaMontagne painted the portrait to commemorate Hadfield taking over as commander of the ISS on March 13th. In a blog post, he says he was inspired by the images and videos Hadfield has been sharing from space.

The portrait was digitally painted in Photoshop CS6 Extended with a Wacom Cintiq 24HD. Final file dimensions are 32″X24″ at 300ppi.

The reference was a screen capture from the YouTube video that according to LaMontagne, "Meant the quality wasn’t great, but I muddled through. Photos are never used as part of the painting, all was painted from scratch. I wanted desperately to put stars in those windows, but they just wouldn’t be visible in real life, so I kept that urge in check."