Notes from our 04/29/21 class meeting ...

We looked in class at the elements of faces... the standard features...

Eyes:  halfway between the top of the head and the chin.  The pupils are always dark.  Tips of the ears are as high as the eyebrows when the face is pointing straight forward.

Nostrils:  two black dots, perhaps oval or slightly pear-shaped.  A little curved line on the left and the right can indicate the outside edge of the nostril.

Mouth:  a single line can say it.  Maybe thicker toward the center.  A little line coming down from each side makes it natural.

Try drawing a bunch of small ovals for faces.  Put in the dots for eyes.  Do they focus on something close or far?  Are they accusing or pleading?  Focused on the heavens or the earth?

Do each face's mouths and the eyes agree?  How can you reconcile them if they don't?  (Art therapy..?)

So, scribble in ink a great big pile of faces on paper, until the mouths tell you how to make the eyes or the eyes tell you how to make the mouths.

Like these !  Tra-la-la...   (These eyes were anticipating that hair would be added to the top of the head, so they are higher than they would usually be.)

The face in the lower left hand corner finally has it together...

Then...

Sketch whole beings whose bodies match their heads ...

For practice in putting pupils in eyes, print out the image below.  This lets you practice putting pupils into eyes in just the right spot.  They can focus on the distance or focus on the viewer.  The smaller version of each person shows how the pupils were originally.  You can make them very different.

 

Going from line drawings to paint, we can begin to have fun with shadings.  Pulling just a little paint back here and there,

our portraits can have a slightly brighter forehead and upper cheeks like the fellow in the upper right corner of card #1 below.  Or they can have a very bright forehead and pronounced cheekbones, like the fellow in the lower right corner of card #2.  A couple of very light lines complete his eyes. 

If you put down a puddle of sienna, shape it like a face, pull back paint from the tip of the chin and the cheekbones, it can become very easy to proceed further from there.

 

Note also the fourth person on card 2 - how little upgrading of the paint puddle it took to add a crown, a hairdo and a sniffy nose, making the face very regal. No chin.

Here is a general chart of high spots and low spots on the face.  It doesn't include baggy eyes (easy!).  Lines on the face need to have their edges shaded, usually.  The dark collar defines the chin.  Nose outlines could be much lighter.  Tip of nose brighter.  Hair needs practice...
The head is tilted forward, with the ear tips higher than the eyebrows and showing the top of the hair.  The image still wants the tiniest shadow at the base of the nose.

 

Our challenge for next Thursday - paint a complete portrait!

You may want to use a photo or two as a resource.  Ideally paint a whole person.  Maybe several...

Good luck with it all, and I hope to see you next Thursday at our usual time and place.

Interest has been building in going on-site.  We could go to the park north of the art museum and paint mental snapshot portraits of the people passing by.  A special skill waiting to be developed, there.

Have fun,

Dan