Teeth Showing
 

I've done a couple of portraits with teeth showing and it's hard to get rid of the "horses mouth" or "buck teeth" look. There has to be the right amount of space between the teeth and lower lip, and the teeth have to have the right shapes, sizes, and have good shading. Does anyone charge extra for teeth? :D

Several of my portraits lately have included toothy smiles (some at the parents' request, some were posthumous portraits from existing photos, etc). I didn't charge extra.

For me the key is not to make the teeth too bright. I found the best "color" for teeth is varying mixtures of burnt umber and white. That way they're not too yellow and not to grey.

The drawing of the teeth has to be perfect (each tooth exactly the right size and shape, etc) or it won't look right. It's as time consuming as doing the eyes, if not more!

Of course, many people feel that a portrait should show a more subtle, timeless expression than what you get from a toothy grin. I guess that's up to each artist and client to decide.

:thumbsup: Charge extra for teeth? :D Hmmmmm... now THAT is a really good idea! Thanks Rochelle. Sometimes people balk when I say that I will not paint anyone with their teeth showing.

Maybe the best way to put a quick end to these discussions is to tell them that I will indeed paint an open mouth for $500 extra, plus an additional $250 for each tooth. :D

This will help me pay MY dental bills and make both me and my dentist very happy. :D

Hi Rochelle,

I usually avoid teeth if at all possible. Here is my advice about painting them:

-Do not individualize each tooth. Paint the teeth as connected forms, on a series of planes that lie on an arc.

-It's mainly important to get the value right. Teeth are usually darker than one might think.

-Be true to the expression. Once a person is smiling enough to show teeth, their eyes begin to close. Resist the pull to paint wide-open eyes with a toothy smile

-Mimimize the value of the shadow you will see in the nasal labial fold (the crease running from the corner of the mouth to the outside of the nostril's wing) as your photo will show it darker than it would be if you were observing the subject from life.

I also agree that big smiles tend to look more frozen, and that gentle pleasant expressions are more timeless.

Chris

I've always admired the way Shelley Stansfield was able to paint the teeth in this series of portraits: http://www.portraitartist.com/stansfield/devon2.htm, not really individualizing each tooth but treating them as a single mass. Easier said than done.

I agree with Michele's comments and would add that as difficult as they are it is neccessary to learn how to paint them. You will have occasions when it you must include the teeth but otherwise I find the big grin with teeth an indication that the subject has responded to something of the moment or to the presense of a camera and is thereby less revealing of long term personality and character.

I would avoid charging extra for teeth or any other parts of the face and head. Would you charge less for one ear showing and long hair versus short, etc? I don't think you want to get into piecemeal assembly discussions with clients.

Attached is a detail of a posthumous portrait with the biggest full mouth/teeth challenge I ever had to face. Actually, I dread more so the kind that I will soon face when I paint an older gentleman with crooked and discolored teeth showing through a half smile.

:) Jim, I only suggested charging for teeth as a way of discouraging those who won't take "NO, I don't paint teeth" for an answer. I've found that folks are apt to back off if you threaten their wallet.

The thought of painting a gleaming set of choppers like the ones you did Jim, would surely lead me to a complete and total nervous breakdown.

I confess, I couldn't possibly produce as good a portrait as you did in your example. Congratulations on doing the impossible!

By the way, I remember seeing in the Peabody Museum in Salem, MA a framed artist's list of prices circa 1700's. It really was a standard practice for an artist to charge by the hand, ear, etc. :thumbsup: :thumbsdow This is why so many early portraits of men had one hand hidden inside their shirt...they were too poor/cheap to pay for painting two hands. (Note that there weren't many toothy grins in those days either). Next time I'm in the neighborhood, I'll get a copy of this list and post it.

I think charging for teeth might be the answer for me as well Karin. Since I'm the type to labor over minute details and paint in layers, An opened mouth with a set of teeth means a whole chunk of concentration and effort.

Rembrandt did such a beautiful job painting pearls, maybe I could strive for the Rembrandt, pearly white look and offer this feature to my clients. I don't know what they would think of something like that but it would make the painting of teeth less of a burden and possibly more fun.

No problem
 

Usually when an artist tells me they won't do teeth, it's because they haven't done it much and are afraid to. There is no tenet for "appropriateness" of teeth in a portrait. If it's central to the subject's character, just do it. Everything comes with practice.

I try to obtain a relaxed, "in-between" expression, however, with some subtlety, as it wears better over time. The 500-watt, public relations grin is better suited to photographic portraits and short-term viewing.

One method I use for teeth and for the whites of eyes is to paint them the same value as the surrounding skin tone first, and adjust slightly as needed. This keeps me from painting them too light and brilliant. (Most of the time with eyes, I paint the whites at the same time as the surrounding skin, with the same skin color value, and then gray them only slightly to correct color.

For teeth, I draw them very individually and carefully first--teeth are never perfect and are as individual as fingerprints--and then blur the divisions between them slightly, especially between the front two, to avoid the impression of a row of perfect little tombstones or "chicklets."

Teeth
 

Hi Tom,

I like to do teeth the way you do. If you get the shadows around the teeth right, then smudge the middle of the teeth they look right. I attached an example.

Tombstones in the mouth would be pretty scary, Tom; Chicklets are somewhat more appealing. My teeth are crooked and yellow even after years of painful braces. I notice that most of the portraits on your website are smiling. :D

I have drawn tens of thousands of smiles with teeth, but, if the teeth are bad, it is very hard to draw the portrait. I once had to draw an older gentleman from a photo which had bad teeth showing - REALLY BAD! I drew them as they were, impressionistically. The customer rejected the portrait, however, citing no specific reason. She later gave me a picture of the man without a smile. I redid the portrait, and she happily paid me.

I do not draw smiles anymore if the teeth are bad. (Most people do not smile with bad teeth anyway!)

Teeth
 

Lon, did you ever look at John Wayne's teeth? Awful. I painted them and they looked alright but I wondered why he never fixed them.

Teeth or not to teeth
 

I agree with Chris about the timelessness of non-toothy smiles. Many capable artists before us have been quite able to paint anything, including teeth, and have CHOSEN not to. I rather prefer smirks and grins and even twinkles in the eyes.

Furthermore these looks are far more engaging to look upon.

Maybe charging more for teeth is a good policy - about $20,000 more.

It seems to me that the reason the "old masters" painted more subdued expressions (no teeth) is because they didn't have photographs to work from that captured those brief flashing smiles. We think of these traditional old portraits and that's what has created the aesthetic we often try to emulate today.

I'm happy to paint a portrait either way, depending on the character of the subject and what happens during the photo sessions. Sometimes the irrepressible joy of a kid is what a parent wants to capture and remember and a beaming smile is the only way to express that.

A couple of years ago I did a pastel of two sisters sitting back to back and both looking at you with big bright pearly whites. Their father was my DENTIST!

Also consider that in "Olden Tymes" (TM) people generally lost their teeth quite early on. Those teeth that remained were not always the nicest to look upon.

George Washington was particularly known to have very bad teeth. In the civil war, the requirement for being a soldier was that you have two good front teeth to bite the paper casing off the bullet cartridge.

I believe that the main reason teeth have been omitted is that they were not attractive.

That said, I prefer a not to paint teeth where possible. You generally get a much more interesting subject when they smile but don't show teeth.

Subjects who were long in the tooth
 

The old masters probably didn't paint smiles because most of their subjects were missing their teeth.

Back to the old concept that people will buy what they can see. If you have toothy grins in your portfolio, you will tend to attract clients that like their children's portraits with toothy grins. Robert Schoeller almost never painted them and thus, was seldom asked, but still had plenty of work. He attracted the kind of work that he showed.

I've often theorized that the reason there were so few smiles in portraits and photos of old also had a lot to do with the fact that life was very hard for most people. I wouldn't be smiling much if I had to do laundry by hand, do canning for the winter, heat my stove with wood I had to chop, make candles for light, etc. Of course, the wealthy had servants to do that.

Mike, I can empathize. The hardest commission I ever had was a little boy and BOTH of his parents were orthodontists. They not only wanted him as he was, but, I think at least subconsciously, wanted him as he would be when they were done correcting his smile. I ended up having to try and read their minds, an exercise in diminishing returns.

Rochelle is right that a lot of my portraits show some teeth. Partly because, I think, I'm comfortable painting them, and partly because my interaction with and attitude toward the sitters creates that kind of feeling. I do worry sometimes that I end up liking the subjects TOO much, and that it skews the work, especially in the portraits of children.

As regards the old masters, who can say what actually was going on? The necessity for subjects to sit for long periods, in lieu of photographic sessions, was the main factor, I believe. However I still come down on the position that if your subjects smile a lot - are very extroverted, outward and warm - that's how you should portray them. I'll leave it to the work of Frans Hals, one of my heroes, to make my point.

Happy painting (no pun intended)!

OK, I'll bite...
 

(pun intended) Tom, I'm curious as to why you think liking your subjects too much would skew the work? I would think that would be an advantage! Imagine trying to make a good painting of someone you DIDN'T like or respect! That would be the untimate test to me.

This seems to be an unofficial string for voting on teeth, so my personal preference is for no teeth, not because I am afraid to paint them, I just like the look of the painting more. Tom's portraits are wonderful and he handles teeth beautifully, but diversity is a good thing, especially with portrait painting. We pick up great tips from each other, but we still need that individuality.

I can't believe it's August already!

We may be opening up a separate thread here, but here goes. I phrased that post partly that way to spark discussion. I really don't apologize for liking my clients. It's healthy.

Maybe I'm just wistful for the really quiet, evocative introspection I see in other's portraits and would like to explore more of it in mine. One of my favorite child portraits ever is a wonderful, quiet, head-and-shoulders that Dawn Whitelaw placed in the PSOA finals year before last. I wonder if I could bring a little more "discerning watchfulness" to my sessions and get this, but I'm pretty outgoing and I know it influences what I get back. And if I think TOO much while shooting my reference, I get in my own way and miss everything. It's a Zen thing.

Also, I do often give my clients a choice between an outward and an introspective image, and often press for the latter, but I'm enough of a businessperson not to get in a huff if they don't choose what I want them to. And, I do a good bit of posthumous work, and the available reference in these instances is usually a smiling file photograph. So some of it is out of my control. Cynthia's point about having what you WANT to paint in your portfolio is well taken, also -people will pick what you show 'em.

I'm going to bow out of this thread now and see where it goes. Maybe check back in later.

Love to everyone.

I've created a new topic called "Liking your clients?" in the Cafe. To continue this subject, please post over there. http://forum.portraitartist.com/show...&threadid=1077

Thanks!

At the risk of reviving a topic that may already have been chewed to death, I wanted to point out that no one can maintain a natural-looking smile while sitting for hours at a time. My first attempt at an oil portrait depicted my teenage daughter, who posed for me while I painted, and her final expression was bland and uninspiring. Then I began working from my own photos in which I typically try for more spontaneous expressions. Particularly with children, that seems to involve a smile complete with teeth. That look works well with my specialty of "portraits in a natural setting." Personally I really enjoy portraits of children with infectious grins on their little faces, although that may not be to everyone's taste. However, I do think that if the masters had had Nikons we'd see a lot more teeth in their paintings.

Poor Teeth
 

Some time ago I posted a portrait with big teeth on this thread and recently finished the face on the attached painting. As you can see he did not worry about showing his short, crooked, and stained teeth. (Quite a difference) Years ago I worked with this former exec and remembered the ever present smile and knew that a closed mouth would be uncharacteristic. Friends and strangers to the subject don't seem to notice or comment about them.

Close up of the above.

Beautiful job, Jim. It's amazing how much the unique positioning of the teeth in a subject's mouth lends credibility to a likeness. If you'd given him perfect teeth (not that you would have been tempted) it would truly have fulfilled Sargent's comment about a portrait's being a painting with something wrong about the mouth.

Tough teeth
 

I was commissioned to do this portrait of a man whose smile only showed his lower teeth!!!

Close up of this
 

This was the only photograph available of this man. Sometimes you just do it.

While I respect any artist's right not to show teeth, I agree with Tom Edgerton that if it's central to the subject's character, just do it.

A lot of my subjects don't take themselves too seriously and the ones who are very animated sometimes look more natural smiling than not. So I do paint smiling portraits as well as unsmiling ones. Most people want some sort of pleasant expression.

Smiles shouldn't be considered a big no-no. I've done some research and find we're in pretty good company. You can go back to The Laughing Cavalier, but also in today's world I have pictures of smiling portraits by: Everett Raymond Kinstler, Dean Paules, Daniel Greene and Robert Schoeller. Not that they necessarily do a lot of them, but they do do them.

Teething!
 

I'm currently doing two commissions - one "with teeth" and one "without". In the situation of the "with teeth" portrait, showing the teeth was unavoidable. But for the the other, when the client expressed wanting a toothy smile, I used my usual explanation which works well.

I told the client that we get used to seeing toothy smiles from photography. They look natural. Subconciously, we know that a photo was taken in a fraction of a moment, and so smiling that long is normal to expect.

A painting, however is not done in a fraction of a moment. It takes hours of work to complete. So a big smile is "unnatural", as it would logically be impossible for the sitter to have sustained it. So the reason why they look goofy in painted portraits is that we're subconciously bothered by the logic. A demure closed lip smile is sustainable, and appropriate.

Hope that helps.

Linda

Linda, this has been debated before but I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with a toothy smile as long as it looks spontaneous. No one can sustain a natural-looking closed mouth smile for very long either; it ends up looking forced and stiff, and that stiffness can spread to the expression of the eyes, as well.

The same argument you cited could be applied to many classical paintings, including Degas' ballet series. These, too, obviously captured a fraction of a second; no one maintains a ballet stance that long either. Brueghel's scenes also come to mind; again the artist attempted to capture complex activities and depict them as though they were frozen in time. And Eakins has a woman with her mouth open in song and a man in mid-leap at a swimming hole. Once you get away from the very formal studio portrait I think it comes down to preference: either the painter's or the client's.

Teeth or not
 

I didn't mean to offer my explanation as saying that anything that one cannot sustain for hours is "unnatural" in a painting. I was just offering an option on how to persuade a client when you the artist feel a toothy smile is not in the best interest of the painting or client's goal. I think the public gets trained by seeing photos to the point that not smiling seems uncomfortable. Being conscious of this fact makes them take on the project of a portrait with fresh eyes.

WE know that a painting with even hint of a smile still communicates to the viewer, but we simply have to assure our clients of that. I do agree with you that toothy smiles are totally valid and appropriate, so I'mm only talking here about the cases in which it's not going to bring the best outcome.

I think it's better to offer a reasonable explanation that a customer could concede to than turn the issue into a power struggle.

Good point, Linda. I do see what you're saying. I haven't been faced with a situation in which exposed teeth would be a disaster, but that's a good ploy to get yourself out of painting such a thing. Normally I go with the client's preference in pose and expression because they know what aspect of the subject they're interested in memorializing in paint. Often it's not the expression I would have chosen, but when I suggest another one they always have an excellent reason why they would prefer theirs.

Sometimes the expression that I think looks best or most attractive is the forced smile the child offers to a stranger, sometimes it's the look of the child when he's about to try to pull something over on the parent, and sometimes it's just not the expression that the client fell in love with when he first met his wife, while the other one is. But it's useful to have rationales to offer if a client's about to commission a horror.

Restate
 

I think the two better reasons for not painting teeth are not about difficulty. A broad smile is a contraction of muscles - very hard to hold if one is working from life. So, the answer is photos? Well, if the work bespeaks of being made from a photo, that is NOT the answer. I think paintings that look like real people are better than those that look like real photos.

If you did a painting of a man about halfway up a chin-up bar it would be hard to look at - the viewer would know his muscles are contracting and the moment is very fleeting... so with broad smiles.

Sargent and Hals did smirks nicely.

Many artists of the past painted people in poses they could not have held for very long. The paintings were meant to convey a transitory moment. (I was studying Rubens' Saint George and the Dragon the other day, which I have attached as one example.)

I wouldn't avoid painting smiles simply because people can't hold one for thirty hours. The model for Saint George didn't hold his arm in the air for thirty hours either.

Frans Hals
 

I agree Michele.

My all time favorite, Frans Hals, as Tim pointed out was a master at capturing that "fleeting moment" (with teeth exposed most of the time), but I'm sure they didn't hold those poses for an extended period of time.

I think each set of circumstances are different depending on the subject and mood that is attempting to be portrayed.

I, too, agree, Michele, as I've expressed earlier in this thread. It's interesting to read everyone's opinions and consider how valid they are for our own circumstances, but ultimately it comes down to a question of personal preference. A number of your portraits include visible teeth and I think they work wonderfully; it all depends on the look the artist is aiming for - as well as the nature of the subject.

Sometimes it seems that a lot of unnecessary energy is being expended in efforts to set up a hard and fast rule - for whether teeth should be shown, or whether the client should see a work in progress, and so forth - when it's basically just a matter of individual taste and working methods. So many of the people on this forum are wonderful artists who have developed their own unique styles; the diversity of subject matter, composition, process and marketing techniques is what makes SOG so fascinating and such a wonderful learning experience.

Pose
 

A rearing horse provokes tension/action - it's not what I want to depict in a portait. This wears better me thinks.

We debated this topic in another long thread, but I had to post to agree with Michele. That's the best argument I've ever seen refuting the "one can't hold it, so don't paint it" argument. Thanks so much.

I paint teeth as often as not. However, for me the reason to do it is not to cave to the demands of an unsophisticated client, it's to properly depict the inner life of the subject. If it's appropriate, take the cue from Frans Hals--also one of my favorites--and do it.

If a client is asking for the 500-watt PR smile, I merely explain that it won't wear well over time and steer them to an "in-betweener." I don't feel artistically bankrupt in doing so either. And, surprise, sometimes it's actually more complex and lifelike a depiction psychologically than an expression that portrays impending suicide, for example. And, conversely, when my client is inwardly oriented and serious, that's what I paint.

Neither path leads to a higher truth, it's just one more in a series of choices.