Oil Sketch on Watercolor Paper
 

All of this talk recently about paper has infected me as well. Below is a demonstration of an oil sketch of my daughter Eva at 4

I

Working from a reference photo, the drawing is blocked in using burnt umber and developed until the contrast is dark and strong.

If I were painting a more formal portrait I

Before I start

Building up the dry underdrawing in white is the most difficult and time consuming stage of the portrait. In this case, I

If I were a teacher I

Rembrandt used very thick lead-based white paint ground to his specifications at the local molenaar (miller). I

While I

Looking carefully at my daughter from life, (it

It

One last ultra-thin glazing on the highest values only. The tendency is to want to unify the face by glazing the entire face over and over again, but repeated glazing on the shadow areas will create brown shadows--something to be avoided.

To finish it off, I

Detail