Wednesday, November 11, 2015

721 Ruby

As I recently mentioned, I am taking an online course on portrait painting.  It is very organized, informative, well taught and includes homework.  Our second assignment is to pick a photo ( with no teeth showing!).  Using a timer, observe it for 2 minutes, then put it away, and paint from memory for a timed 15 minutes.  I can't even consider showing you how horrifying that painting was.  Next we studied the painting for 2 more minutes, followed by 15 more minutes of painting.  We did that for 2 more times until we reached an hour of painting from memory.  It was still still horrible, and I was so unsettled that I spent another hour doctoring up the painting by looking at the reference photo.  I put it aside for a day, and of course, errors were glaring when I returned to it today, so I spent another hour moving features around and adjusting lights and darks.  In the photo, Ruby was a baby, and the child in the painting above looks much older.  Considering I haven't tackled portraits in the past, I feel I am making progress, but there is still much to learn.  I have nowhere to go but "up." 

No comments:

Post a Comment