[Davem]

Well i've finally finished this piece... by finished i mean that i cant actually do anything more to it as its been printed, framed and given as a present. There's still a few errors (like the left eye being a touch too small) but i'm pretty happy with it for my fist ever portrait in any medium. It was given as a gift to my Dad for his 50th B'day on the weekend (thats him in the pic) He liked it a lot.

Having said all that if anyones got any comments or crits about this piece then please let me know. I wont be changing the picture anymore but i'd love to know anything that might help for future pictures.


detail1
detail2
reference

cheers

Dave

[Highfive]

Hey, nice work! Easy to see why your dad liked it so much. It must've be so carefully painted, judging from the detail shots.

How large was the print?

[Davem]

Thanks HighFive.

It took about 15 hours to work on (over about a month i think), but a lot of that was going over areas i'd kind of already done, plus it took awhile to get back into the swing of things if i hadnt worked on it for a while.

In the end it was about A3 size at 300 dpi. buying an extra 256MB of Ram halfway through really boosted PS performance.

Dave

[Shiro_tengu]

Outstanding and the best work I have ever seen you do. Time well spent and a really thoughtful present.

[Dennis Sedov]

I think that your painting is great. I don't have much to add to what you have done, but if you try to play with light that would help you develop more skills on how to define volumes and shapes. Your coloring is also great for this particular picture, but the whole nature of it looks flat, as if in flash photography.

If you experement with light, read about some standart lighting models (even the simple 3 point lighting) that would help you increase the "feel" of your paintings. Try to add some mood to it. I know that this was not your intension, but if you look at Art of Craig Mullinsfor example you will understand what I mean

[ December 12, 2001: Message edited by: Dennis Sedov ]

[Malachi Maloney]

Very nice.
The eyes are a little "off", but you know that already.
The only suggestion I can offer is:
His left ear (our right) could use a little more detail. It just looks a little flat in comparison to how detailed the rest of his face is.

Again, great work.

Where's fleabrain? This is right up his alley.

Malachi

[Davem]

Thanks everyone

Shiro: Cheers Dude i definitely got a lot out of this, both personally and skill wise.

Dennis: Yeah i agree with the flash photography flatness. To begin with I tried to figure out how to soften the look of the flash as i was painting from the reference. I found it difficult to imagine a different lightsource than the reference so settled on trying to make better colour and skin tone but leave the shading pretty much as is. I really love craigs work and hopefully will try some of those techniques in further work. I want to try my hand at multiple art styles from painterly stuff through to cell / ink style cartoon images. I've got a fair bit of experience in 3D but lack a lot of the groundwork skills to push it any further.

Malachi: Cheers man, the ear was a bit of a problem. It ws really red in the reference so i got a bit confused when i tried to make it less obviuos in the painting. I guess i kind of got fed up with that area and didnt put as much effort in, and it shows.

Dave

[Jezebel]

Your dad is absolutely going to love this. It's a great portrait. You did a good job with it.