Monday, February 21, 2011

Davi's Mama - WIP 3

I have this painting to this point, and, after seeing it on the computer monitor I see a few things I need to address. It is always so much more clear to see problems on the PC than in person, holding the painting! I need to reshape her eyes, especially her right eye, with the lower lid scrunching up over the right side of the eyeball more. I also need to add a few more darks to the hair sections.

I will submit this for critique to the WcW group, consider any suggestions here, and take care of what I see myself. Then, this should be done. For once I managed to get the mouth right and she does look like a toothless woman, which was one of the reasons I wanted to paint her photo. My other goal was to get the facial contours to suggest all the wrinkles, instead of just having the darker lines to suggest them. I am pleased so far with that, and with just a little further tweaking I will be finished with that. Another thing I like about this was I managed to show the kindness in this lady's eyes, and I don't want to do anything to detract from that, but I do need to fix that right eye and work on the left one a bit more, too, to make them correct.

Anyone see anything other than what was mentioned above that I need to do with this?

6 comments:

RH Carpenter said...

I don't see anything else but the eyes, Susan, and you have one tilting up towards the nose while the other is tilting down from the nose so they need to be brought in line just a bit more. I know you'll work that out - good going with this one. Will you go darker with anything else?

Vicki Greene said...

You have done an excellent critique so all I have left to do is to say great job. Love those wrinkles!

Watercolors by Susan Roper said...

Rhonda - Thanks so much for pointing out the differences in the slant of the eyes, I thought I had it all figured out with the bottom lids being anatomically wrong...of course I missed the slant problem! I needed to start this one immediately after having done another portrait, it was like starting all over again and not knowing what to do when I started this one. I think good portrait artists must need to make that their niche and just keep doing them forever to get good at them. I tend to be all over the map with subject matter.

Vicki - Thanks for the encouragement! I tend to do my best critiques when looking at a painting on the computer, there is something about having that detail that I notice things I should have while painting (other than having missed the eye problem Rhonda pointed out!).

RH Carpenter said...

Susan, I think you're right about portrait painters - they just paint portraits and doing it over and over, they get better each time. I tend to jump around subjects, too :)

Anonymous said...

FOR THE EYES, I LOVE THEM. I HAD A GIRLFRIEND I HUNG AROUND WITH IN SCHOOL. HER ONE EYE WAS DROOPY EYE WHICH MADE HER SPECIAL. IT TAUGHT ME EVERYONE IS NOT PERFECT.THINK ABOUT IT BEFORE YOU CHANGE IT.

GRANNY.

Anonymous said...

FOR THE EYES, I LOVE THEM. I HAD A GIRLFRIEND I HUNG AROUND WITH IN SCHOOL. HER ONE EYE WAS DROOPY EYE WHICH MADE HER SPECIAL. IT TAUGHT ME EVERYONE IS NOT PERFECT.THINK ABOUT IT BEFORE YOU CHANGE IT.

GRANNY.