Official World Record
Bucks: The Hanson Buck and The Chip Lake Buck
(also
known as The Broder Buck)
Renowned pencil artist Owen Garratt has been
commissioned to create artwork and Limited Edition
Prints of the two Official Boone and Crockett
(B&C) World
Record Bucks!
The Hanson Buck, the B&C Typical whitetail World Record
is limited to 1993 prints.
The Broder Buck, the B&C Non-Typical Mule Deer world
Record is limited to 1926 prints.
Painstakingly drawn in graphite pencil, over four months
was spent creating these best selling portraits.
“My Dad was kind of upset that I had the Hanson Buck at
my house and I didn’t tell him either time.”
“Milo Hanson and his son Brad were traveling to a show
in Minnesota, when this commission came around, and as
Regina is on the way (where we still lived), he swung by
and I set up the photography studio to take my reference
shots.”
“The next step was to con Rod into traveling up to
Edmonton with me to take reference photos of The Broder
Buck, at Craig Broder’s place. I had my notes from the
Hanson Buck photo shoot and had chosen the best
lighting, camera settings and angles, so duplicating the
conditions at Craig’s house was a cinch.”
“Doing two portraits side by each
is a complete pain in
the fundament (ass). They’re kind of intended to go as a set,
and while I had tackled the lighting and detail I needed
in my photos, the problem was keeping them the same
size … I couldn’t make one bigger than the other, they had
to match …somehow.”
“What reference points could I use? The eyes – which one
would think is a standard kind of thing – are set
differently from a white tail to a mule deer. The Muley’s ears were bigger, but the whitetail’s neck is
thicker ... argh!!!”
“AND, the Hanson Buck is a head and shoulders mount,
while the Chip Lake Buck is a full body mount.”
“It came down to trusting my eye, and being willing
to make
a lot of false starts. But I got it. Eventually.”
“The next challenge was publishing the limited edition
prints. We had them done at a reputable place in Regina,
but the amount of black in the background became
problematic. To get the deepest blacks, the press had to
go so dark that it clogged up the lighter parts.
Ultimately we had to reject the prints and try again.
Then we travelled to Saskatoon and tried another press
house, and we ended up developing a new proprietary
process that I’ve used ever since to publish my Limited
Edition Prints.”
“By Christmas the drawing was done, and as Milo lives in Biggar, and The Colonel is from Unity
(which is about an
hour away), I took a leave from the festivities to go
over to Milo’s so he and I could sign the edition.”
“Then Ron and I slid back up to Edmonton and Craig and I
signed his Broder Buck prints.”
“At the time it struck me as a convoluted way to do some
art, but I’ve found since that convincing artwork needs
some heavy shovel work behind it, or it lacks
authority.”
“People know if you know, and they know if you DON’T
know or if you’re just copying something.”