Painting your much-loved pets can be an aspiration for any budding artist, and cats are often an animal that can cause problems. Take away the anxiety with the help of animal portrait expert Vic Bearcroft as he takes to step-by-step through the stages involved in capturing the cunning beauty of one of the nations favourite animals.

The easy-to-follow DVD guide will take you though the five creative steps required to create a noble long haired black and white cat and a cheeky tabby.

Vic starts with sketching out and tonal layers, to blocking out, details and finishing with highlights. He advises which part of the pastel to use to create texture and interest, as well as emphasising the need to keep working the pastel into the velour paper to maintain a soft, fur-like effect. All of the techniques Vic uses can be applied to any animal portrait, so you'll see your skills improve the more you use them across various different projects and paintings.

Please note that while this is a Region 0 DVD, it is PAL formatted and therefore unlikely to play in North America, Japan, South Korea and some of the Pacific Islands.

However, all DVDs will play on personal computers and laptops.