I think, speaking honestly, that I abhore anyone's sentimentality except my own.
But I am curious - are there really 10,000 people who can realistically depict anything - especially a person? ESPECIALLY a person? That seems arbitrarily dismissive. I doubt its veracity.
Perhaps 10000 people can realistically depict the Tree in the generic, but nobody ever said "That's not my tree."
If the portrait depends on the likeness, there's more than the photographic likeness at stake. Isn't there?