Category Archives: Techniques

Rita’s Portrait ~~ Session Five: More Home Work, using the iPad

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I had made good progress during my work based on the reference photograph, but I decided it wasn’t good enough.  As a way to visualize changes that might improve the painting, I decided to do a mark-up on the iPad, using a side-by-side comparison with the reference photo.

markup of portrait using iPad

markup of painted portrait, as a result of side-by-side comparison with photo. iPad screenshot.

I cropped the photo included in my September 8th post and imported it digitally into the ArtRage app on my iPad.  I then ‘painted’ over the portrait area, trying to remedy the problems I identified in the painting.  This was a freehand process, done by ‘eyeballing’ the photo reference.  ArtRage is not able to make measurements for a closer comparison of the two images.

I like this markup as well as the final painting — if not more!  The ability to easily edit iPad marks liberates me from feeling that each (potentially incorrect) modification is ‘permanent’.  Playing around with the marks often yields spontaneous and interesting ideas that I would never have attempted initially in oils.

Even though I liked the resulting mark-up, I knew it would still be a challenge to implement these ideas in oil paint on the actual painting.

 

Portrait Gallery Figurative – in the Window Seat, #1

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resting at the Portrait Gallery

Resting at the Portrait Gallery.  Oil on Linen.

During a recent visit to the National Portrait Gallery, I saw two marvelous women, each sitting in one of the deep window seats that back up to the courtyard.  I decided to be bold and ask if I could take their pictures for painting purposes.  To my delight, each agreed.  Here’s the first – a petite little lady perched on the long cushion, resting her feet.  Another palette knife attempt.

Portrait Workshop with Bill Schneider

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I recently studied portrait painting with Bill Schneider.  After he did a wonderful demo, Bill had us emulate Nicholai Fechin’s gorgeous ‘broken color’ style, by copying (on a larger scale, so we could practice our facial measuring skills) some Fechin portraits.

Fechin's portrait (L) and my copy. oil on canvas.

Fechin’s portrait (L) and my copy. oil on canvas.

First I copied one of Fechin’s beautiful women.  And then this precious child.

Fechin's portrait (L) & MOW copy. oil on canvas.

Fechin’s portrait (L) & my copy. oil on canvas.

The next day we painted from a live model, attempting to apply the broken color method on our own.  Quite a difference in beauty, eh?  (Just keeping it real!)

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Working toward Fechin’s ‘broken color’ in painting from life. oil on Arches oil paper.

I ended the weekend workshop with lots to practice and mull.  Thanks, Bill!

 

Catching Up!! Studies a Plenty to Share

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Here’s another study (unfinished) that I did during that wonderful Maggie Siner workshop awhile back.  Maggie wanted us to be very definite in matching colors and then put a big juicy stroke in the MIDDLE of the shape we were working on.

Dino, Pot & White Cat. Unfinished. Oil on Linen.

Terracotta Pot, White Cat & Dino on Pig-shaped Cutting Board. Unfinished. Oil on Linen.

Never put your first paint stroke next to an edge, she says, or you’ll be tempted to paint the object rather than the shape.  Maggie gave us a wonderful motto to paint by:  Great shapes, not great objects, make a good painting!

 

The Second Exercise of the Siner Workshop: a Three Value Study

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This exercise, much different from that showcased last time, reviewed key principles for a successful painting:  make an interesting pattern of darks and lights — and join similar values wherever feasible.  This painting may be a bit hard to suss out because many shapes were ‘lost’ in simplifying the scene into only three values.  Notice how the highlight atop the left ‘spoon’ melts into the light background.  And how the highlight on the short central spoon creates a strange form when linked by the mid-tone to the tall spoon handle immediately behind.

Spoons in a Pitcher + Mango + Spatula & Candle Holder. Oil.

Spoons in a Pitcher + Mango + Spatula & Candle Holder. Oil.

The task here was to decide which of the many values in the still life set-up should be grouped into the limited value choices.  Paint obvious ‘lightest lights’ with white and ‘darkest darks’ with raw umber.  Then ask the trickier questions:  where do all of those other values in the set-up belong — in the mid-tone gray or in one of the other options?  Which grouping makes the stronger composition?   Decide on your answers and paint the shapes accordingly, in smooth, flat value tones.  No cake frosting this time!

 

 

We Share Our Color Learnings

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Post-show doldrums are a great time to share insights from prior workshops.  Several of us ‘7 Palettes’ have been sharing new color mixing techniques this week.  Here’s what I passed along from the fabulous Terry Miura workshop my sister Ceci and I attended awhile back.

Here’s a glimpse of Terry’s palette:

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Terry Miura’s Limited Palette

And here are insights about painting the figure using a limited earth-tone palette:

  • Select one of each ‘primary’ color, plus white:   yellow ochre; transparent iron oxide red (‘earth red’ in some brands) , ivory black (standing in for blue) and Titanium white.
  • Using a palette knife, make two ‘puddles’ of paint consisting of a bit of each of the primary colors (in varying proportions, obviously):   a light-toned puddle for use in painting light areas of the figure and a dark toned puddle for shadowed areas.
  • To add variety to the light and shadow areas of the painting, ‘push’ each puddle toward other colors and values by adding relatively more of desired dominant colors and less of the subordinated colors.  For example, mix into part of the light puddle a bit more yellow ochre & some black to make a greenish variant.
  • Make sure that none of the darker values in the light puddle is as dark as the lightest light value in the dark puddle and vice versa.  Imagine a line down your palette between the two puddles to keep them strictly separate.
  • Paint the light areas of the figure using only the light puddle and its variants; and paint the shadowed areas of the figure using only with the dark puddle and its variants.
  • Assuming you’ve drawn the figure fairly well, you’ve got a fine looking painting!

Here’s Terry’s beautiful twenty minute demo!

Terry's nude.

Terry’s nude.

The Portrait Process, Stage 4: Assembling the Jigsaw Puzzle

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The next (huge) task in painting my Dad’s portrait was to meld the many photographic references into a single coherent whole.   I needed to get the head, arms, torso orientation all into similar sizes and then try to get them to connect to each other in a reasonable way. If I were a better Photoshop practitioner, this might have been a snap.  But my attempts were so lame that I seriously considered resorting to cut and paste.

Here are a few of my horrible Photoshop mashups, along with my much more useful iPad sketches.

stacking the pieces into a rough order
stripping out the extraneous stuff
stacking the consolidated torso over the table pose
first try at iPad version
the final one of several efforts to unify the elements into a composition

The Portrait Process, Stage 3: Sketching the Pose within its Rectangle (Time is Passing)

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I’m still a long way from putting brush to canvas.  In fact, the canvas may not even be up on the easel yet.  I’m finding it useful to ‘spend’ more time working up an iPad sketch of the overall pose.  Here are a few glimpses of that sequence.

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