Finished the oil portrait of my youngest daughter. Had a really hard time to get her right eye to match the left in colour and proportion. The detail photo was shot indoors so it turned out a bit yellow but that is the final eye. I used Burnt Sienna, Cobolt and Ultramarine Blue. Yellow Ochre and Cadmium red with Titanium white for the skin.
This spring is much colder than last year but I am an optimist so I have carried the easel out to the porch. Painting in daylight beats indoors anytime but it is almost too cold to keep dexterity.
I have had two good days this month and worked on two oilpaintings, both repaints on top of other ideas. I have used photos for reference on both. The first canvas was a failed portrait in oil.
To avoid letting the old image distract me I turned the canvas to landscape.
This is the loose sketch which I somehow prefer to the more finished state.
Then I tried out different backgrounds digitally.
It resulted in this.
Then I messed it up and left it for a while.
The second canvas was an unfinished acrylic painting by my daughter that she did not want to continue on.
I continued with acrylics sketching indoors.
I really liked how the background provided colour.
When I continued outdoors in oil I restrained myself to Ultramarine to pick up the blue from the acrylic sketch. At that session I also had some of the dirty pastel green and burnt sienna left over on the palette from the other painting and decided to even out the background.
For the skin I use titanium white with yellow ocre and cadmium red.
Continued in next post…
I have tried oilpastels a few times over the years but never quite fell for it. But this time it worked out ok. The secret is to be generous with the paint and have a rough surface. Then it feels almost like painting. It is easy to work over an area several times to get it the way I want it. For the portrait in the bottom picture I used cadmium yellow watercolour as a base.
