Lima Family Portrait - Progress 6

I'm still plugging away on this portrait. I've started on daughter/sister # 2. I also tried to darken the mother's hair which I still need to tweak to try to add body and make it more realistic looking.

"Classic Love" Won First Place

My portrait titled "Classic Love" won First Place tonight in the Annual Open Art Exhibit held at the First Congregational Church in Woburn. The exhibit was part of the Festival on the Common in Woburn Center.

I'm so happy and honored.

Lima Family Portrait - Progress 5

Here's a small update. I have the boy just about finished. I also made some adjustments to the mother.

Lima Family Portrait - Progress 4

Here's another update. I started adding in the boy (my friend's husband). I'm not sure I'm happy with this. I wish the woman/mother came out better. I know I can do better but I can't start over. I want to try to get this done so that it can be framed.

I'm still using a mechanical pencil with a .5 mm 2B lead. I'm also still blending with a tortillion.

Lima Family Portrait - Progress 3

Here's another update. I'm sorry about the darker image. I took a photo using my Sony Cybershot Digital camera and I'm not a very good photographer. I'm not sure why the paper came out dark, especially since I had three lamps on in my studio on.

I have sister/daughter # 1 just about finished. I am using a mechanical pencil with a .5 mm 2B lead and am continuing to blend with a small tortillion. I may go over the darks with a 4B then a 6B pencil to really push the darks.

Lima Family Portrait - Progress Update

Here's an update on my portrait. It's a slow process partly because I'm just not into this. The woman/mother in the portrait really took a lot out of me and shaken my confidence a little. I'm still plugging away and I'm starting to "feel" the passion come back. I hope it will start to show.

I am using a small tortillion to blend, it just feels natural for me. I've been practicing using circulism and Darrel Tank's technique for a tapered stroke but I always go back to tortillions because it just seems right for me.

I think I'm done with the mother and I've started one of the daughters.

Lima Family Portrait - Progress 1 (again)

I finally think I have an accurate line drawing which I'm going to continue on with. I've gone in and reshaped the woman's/mother's face. I think I have it shaped correctly. I did this line drawing using a 0.5mm Berol Mechanical Pencil with an HB lead. The paper is Kilroy 932 Sulphite Bond Drawing Paper - Mechanical Translucency by the Charrette (Pitman Corporation).

Now that I have my line drawing done, I'm going to now move it to my actual drawing surface which will be 14 x 17 Strathmore Bristol Smooth paper. The pencils I'll be using will be Prismacolor Torquoise drawing pencils. My goal is to have this done by Saturday, November 27th. Once I have the line drawing on my drawing surface, I'll start adding tone, texture, and depth hopefully bringing the drawing to life and making it look better than the actual photograph. Another update will be posted soon!

I'm still working on my portrait titled "The Lima Family". I've been having a lot of trouble with it I think because I think I've been expecting too much. I'm going back to my roots on this portrait. I'v figured out that I can't draw like anyone else - I can only draw like me. I've tried the circulism technique like Armin Mersmann and I've tried the cross hatching technique like Darrel Tank. Neither of which feel natural to me. It's funny, I think this is what Armin Mersmann has been trying to teach is viewers all along. I also think this is why I'm having such a hard time with this portrait. I need to put myself in the drawing and no one else.

I'm learning a lot about drawing and seeing my mistakes but mostly, I'm learning about who I am and where I want to go as an artist. I love drawing and bringing people to life on paper. I think this portrait is helping me to find "me". I've made some adjustments to the line drawing to make it more accurate and will be posting later today then I'll be adding tone. I'm done feeling bad about this portrait because I couldn't get to where I thought I wanted it to be. Now, the real drawing begins!

Lima Family Portrait - Progress 3

Well, I ended up re-doing this portrait again. Good grief, I'm having such a hard time with this one. I think it's because the reference photos aren't that good. The details are lost and the defects of the photographs really come out when I scan and enlarge the images. I think I have started this portrait over like 10 times by now and have invested about 30 hours into it but I have nothing completed.

I think I finally have a good likeness of the mother/wife. I think I'm happy with it so far so I'm going to continue on.

Here's the reference photos that I'm using. For the mother, I'm using the face and hair from one photo and the clothing from another.

And here's a WIP image of my drawing. It's not a very good image, because of the size of the portrait I needed to take a photo using my digital camera which I'm still trying to figure out how to use. I then used Photoshop to try to improve the quality but I'm still learning how to use Photoshop too. So this is the best I could do.