Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Portrait and Figure Studio, September 29



6X8 20 minute watercolor sketch, the last sketch of the afternoon. I moved to the other side of the room to sketch this one. I feel more comfortable painting a three-quarter view of a face. I still had trouble with the back of her head. That was the problem I had with the two earlier paintings also. It was just one of those days.

Below is the first pose I painted and then the first sketch of the day followed by the second sketch.



6X8 five minute sketch, the first of the day


7X9.5 inches, three painting sessions of about a half hour each.

When I came home I put my sketches on my easel and critiqued them. I decided I did not have good general proportions so I pulled out three drawing books devoted entirely to drawing heads. I decided to work from Drawing the Human Head by Burne Hogarth.


This is the diagram I used.


This is the correction drawn on a computer copy of the sketch. I also used a transparent grid rather than a ruler to double-check my corrections. I will explain how I used that in another blog.





I left the "extra hair" rather than painting over it so you can see the sketch before correction as well as the after correction in the same painting. As I was writing this, I remembered this pose was one of her short poses so it was not exactly the same as the photo.


7X9.5 watercolor

This is the painting I did during the middle part of the afternoon. I spent about an hour and a half on it, three sessions of a half hour each. This one needed the same proportion adjustments as the five minute sketch. I don't feel it captures the model's likeness or her cheerful personality but every painting is not a success.

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