Well, here are the beginning stages of Aster’s Portrait (Kevin Williams daughter) mentioned earlier.
As you can see from the reference picture, I could not really see Aster’s eyes very well, so I asked Kevin what color her eyes were. I knew they looked brown, but I wanted to know if they were dark brown or touch of hazel, light brown, etc. He told me they were dark brown and so I do what I always do, and went on google to find a pair of dark brown eyes up close to see how they would reflect light.
Then I started with the base of skin color and lips, and then the eyes are always next. I can’t explain it, but when I paint the eyes on all my portrait paintings, it seems like the whole portrait has a sort of life to it, and then everything evolves around that. It’s the feature that brings the whole portrait together.
As I am writing this, I have gone further with the portrait and I will put these up in a day or so and then it’s almost done. I am taking photos in stages best I can. So, this is basically the two main first steps in any portrait I do, and like I have said before, there is always a stage you go through where you think it’s not working out and you just want to start all over again, but it somehow comes together with all the highlights and shadow and tweaking.
Then one or both daughters of mine come into my room, see it and say, “Wow, that looks awesome! That looks just like her”. And then I know I must be just sitting in front of the drawing board way t00 long and need a break. Hope you like it so far! Back to tweaking and highlighting! Cheryl
Aster reference photo
The beginning stages…always looks a little scary
Adding the eyes with highlights…life is now in the portrait…it’s no longer a piece of paper at this point.
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oh this is a wow.when I was first learning to paint faces, the eyes were the absolute most troubling.A classmate told me that she always turns it upside down when she is doing the eyes and since she was a more advanced painter I gave it a try and found it works. So, I am curious whether you have any tricks for getting all that life into the eyes you paint.
Hi Brenda and thank you! Yes, I do turn my portraits upside down every once in awhile while painting the eyes and mouth. Also, I notice when I place the reference photo and the portrait right up next to it, i take off my reading glasses and just look at it as close I can, back and forth, and I can see where I have to change the shape of the hair, lips and other things. I then take a pastel pencil and correct the outline on the portrait lightly and change it when I get back to painting again. It’s almost like squinting to look at your lighted Christmas tree to see where the lights need rearranging. But what really helped me was watching many…many pastel portrait videos on you tube. They help tremendously! Thank you!
Hi Cheryl, This is going to be so wonderful when it is finished. The Lord has gifted you beautifully. I’m sure Kevin and Rachel will treasure Aster’s portrait always!
God bless, Carol
Thank you so much, Carol. That means a lot to me. 🙂