He sells a lot of his work and he's also commissioned to produce pictures, like the striking ones adorning the fast-selling new book, Rutland: Landscapes and Legends, written by former Rutland Times editor Brian Martin.

The most amazing thing about Alan is that he is entirely self-taught. He developed a love of illustrating things while at school and the passion for art has never left him.

"I am so lucky to be able to do something I love," said Alan (71), who lives in Oakham. "I am in very good health and painting must have something to do with that."

The walls of Alan's home are decorated with framed exhibits of his work and he has even hung some of them in the garden to add a dash of colour, as he says. One room has been converted into a gallery showing off more examples of his talent, ranging from family portraits to views of coastal landscapes to scenes of rural Rutland.

"I can still remember the first painting I sold for money when I was in my early 20s," he recalled. "It showed the lovely old stone bridge at Ferry Meadows in Peterborough. Even now I still get a thrill when someone wants to buy my pictures."

One of the most enjoyable sides to his artistic career is the opportunity to travel. He is often commissioned to paint people's homes, some of them wonderful old houses with lots of character and others just modern semi-detached abodes.

Other commissions are more exciting. "I once had to go up in a helicopter and paint power lines being repaired for an electricity company," he remembered.

"Another time I had to do a painting of the roof of Burghley House in Stamford. I was sat up on one of those old chimneys. It was a fantastic view but it was March and it was absolutely freezing."

Painting and drawing was just a hobby for Alan until 25 years ago when he decided to concentrate full time on producing and selling his work for a living.

After leaving school in Stamford he had become an apprentice toolmaker with the Baker Perkins firm in Peterborough.

Then it was off to Germany for two years national service with the Army. Alan was a vehicle mechanic and loved working on officers' cars and other military transport.

He returned to the drawing office at Baker Perkins before taking a job with English Electric near Leicester. There his work included making cutaway illustrations of nuclear power stations. His next job move took him to Oakham company Intertech and involved illustrations for industry.

Alan then made the bold step into the world of animated films. He set up his own company in Melton Mowbray with colleagues and they quickly won contracts with clients such as Rolls Royce, the BBC and the Ministry of Defence.

It was painstaking work which involved making a series of drawings and then converting them into films with the aid of a stop frame camera.

Alan recalled: "We would need a least 12 drawings for every second of film. A three to four minute piece would take us something like six weeks to produce. We got a lot of work. I did the animation for 10 years but I got out at the right time because the industry was becoming computerised and more expensive to be involved in."

Alan sold the company because his painting career was also beginning to take off and he found it more and more difficult to balance the two jobs.

"It was a great wrench to give up the business," he said. "It was also a big risk as I had three children to support."

So where does this talent come from? Alan has never had a lesson in his life. "When I was a young lad I used to draw everything. I decided that drawing was a fantastic way of learning about something because you really have to concentrate on it. I also found it was a great memory aid when I was studying at school. If I drew pictures of facts I could remember them a lot better. I was painting in an amateurish way when I was younger but I got better and better through my teenage years," he explained.

Alan sells most of his work for a few hundred pounds each but he did sell one piece for £1,500.

He will often happen on a scene for a painting by chance. It is usually the way the light falls. Broken clouds often create the best light and usually late evenings or early mornings, when the sun is low, provide good conditions.

He has painted in Italy and France and while he is spending hours producing a picture he will often be joined by interested onlookers.

Alan, who admits he often burns piles of unsatisfactory paintings on a bonfire, said: "People don't tend to come up to you when you are painting abroad. It is more likely to happen when I am working in Rutland. I seem to attract them and I hate it because it disturbs my concentration. Having said that I have met some very pleasant people while out painting."

Alan's first wife Janet died in 2002 after the couple had been married 44 years. They had three children together and all of them live in Oakham. Jane teaches drama and dance and sings in jazz group Blue Juice, Karen is a carer at The Parks School in the town while Gary works at Cavells clothes shop in Oakham. Alan married Stamford-based doctor Anna two years ago.

The best thing Alan ever did was to concentrate on painting for a living. He added: "I am not under pressure like I was in the film animation business.

"Since I took up painting full time I have had a lovely life and amazingly people are buying my work."

To find out more about Alan Oliver's work, log on to his website at www.alan-oliver.co.uk.