Portrait

1. First rough-in of a portrait. 5x7 canvas board. I probably should have done it on a bigger surface, but this is good in it's own way. Burnt Sienna. Need to work on the tones of the underpainting. The grid lines only gave me the general shape and placement of the elements, but they are disappearing quickly, which is good. I'm looking forward to creating shape with different levels tone.

2. This picture is after the second session. I've tried to finesse the shadows and adjust the tonal values, but as I'm new at this, I think I need to spend more time on the values. I have a viewer that helps to isolate the values that I will use during the daylight on Saturday. I'm happy that it's starting to look less flat, but it's looking nothing like the source material right now.

3. This picture has the "black" background added in and the gray of the t-shirt with shading to show folds in the material. I've also worked some more on the undertones on the face. Need to work on the eyes; I think the angle is wrong on them, but it's better than before. Need to get rid of that honkin' huge side-burn. Looks silly. Seem to have lost the eyebrow on the right, but that's in keeping with the source picture. Lots more is going to get "lost" on that side of the face soon. 

I need to get the hair colour filled in, the edge of the t-shirt on the neck needs fixing, lip colour needs adjusting and finessing. Looking at the photo, the hair colour blends right in on the right side, so that's my starting point I think. I should just paint the hair in the same colour as the background and add the gray highlights to the left side.

4. This picture shows hair coloured in, shirt re-done as gray, "black" shadow is introduced on right side moving left. Over did the shadows on the eye and around the nose. I'll have to lighten them next. I added in a white of the eye on the left. I'm starting to regret doing this on such a small surface. It's hard to get the details, like the eye, painted in correctly.

5. Softened shadows, reworked the eyes, side burn fixed. Need to change the angle of the shadow at the corner of the mouth. Eyebrow needs lightening. Maybe repaint the missing side of the face a bit. Shadow under the eye is too shallow on the outside of the curve. I think the shadows on the face need to be redone using the face colour but a bit darker. Perhaps all of the shadows need that.

    

This is the source photo.