[Will Enns]

Steven,

Again, your comments are accurate and do much to steer me on the right track.

You are at a disadvantage though - you don't have the reference photo as I do. Your comment that the dress does not apper to drape over the girls legs is right, but that is not the fault of the photography - it is the fault of the (dare I say?) artist. Now I hesitate to post the reference lest someone point out another multitude of obvious flaws in my work.

I have spent these days studying the painting in light of your comments, which have made it possible for me to see flaws that were invisible to me before.

Also, I have inferred from many other threads that it is not advisable to introduce secondary influences that do not exist in the reference - in this case, the sunset. It is difficult to paint what I cannot see.

Still, I will spend the time I must to salvage this painting, and apply what I have learned to the next. Perhaps by the time I have painted for a full year, I will be able to place the chin closer to the nose than the ear, and make a dress look like it is made of cloth, rather than slabs of plywood. I shall grab the tiller, as you suggest.

I would love to paint from life as suggested, but no one could sit as slowly as I paint.

When I next post for critique, I hope someone will again be as kind and thoughful as you have been.


Chris,

Thank you for the link. I have read the posts and learned much. It is a considerable relief to find techniques that eliminate flash in the hands of a non-expert like myself.

I think my next love affair will be with Rembrandt lighting, about which I have just now learned. And I will reacquaint myself with the window.


Tammy, thank you for your encouraging words.