Portrait, Art Student's League

[Julia Reynolds]

I work much better with life than photos. I can see color much better. I am going to post a portrait I did at the Art Student's League before I took my eight year hiatus. I did this in two and half hours from a live model.

[Michele Rushworth]

Gorgeous portrait from life!

[Michael Georges]

This is really a great job! I love the expression and the vivid use of color and all the values are in the right places.

[Peggy Baumgaertner]

Julia,

A very fine job. I am, however, uncomfortable with the amount of "whiting out" I see. The spottiness on the forehead in particular. There are five white highlights on the forehead. The sensitivity I see in the lower half of the face, the wonderfully articulated jawline and roundness of the lower part of the face is not as visible on the forehead, I would even out the flesh tone and value across the entire forehead, and place the one main highlight as a skittering of light across this even skin tone.

On the same vein, it appears the highlight on the top of the upper lip and under the left eye might be too white. This could also be because of the scan. The rest of the head is so strong and so subtle, I'm thinking that the same subtlety on the forehead would make this outstanding painting.

Peggy

[Julia Reynolds]

Hello Michael, Hello Peggy,

Thanks for the kind words.

Yes Peggy, the overly strong highlights are from my difficulty taking a good picture with a not so good digital camera. The original is much more subtle throughout. I'll try to take better pics in the future. Maybe I'll try to re-shoot this one so that you can see what I mean.

I go to a life drawing class once a week and am going to do some head studies to post here. I am learning so much already and seeing things I couldn't see on my own.

I am also doing a self-portrait in oils which I hope to post if I don't shoot myself first

Thanks for your time and valuable input.

Julia