Birthday Boy

My birthday gift for one of my dearest friends, Rainer, is a portrait. His birthday was two weeks ago, so it's a belated gift. He doesn't follow my blog so I'm fairly confident with posting it and not ruining the surprise. But I've always put it off (for over a decade!) because I didn't have a shot of him that inspired me, and I didn't have an image in my head that I could seize upon. But his Facebook profile pic is really one of my favorite shots of him, and it finally hit me that I should do a portrait based on that. If any of my friends who know Rainer see this, please don't tell him - he already asked me not to ruin the surprise (I usually ask people if I can tell them what their present is if I don't give it to them on the day itself). It's gonna be a while while I tinker with it, but this is the first pass with color blocking.