Jan 30th: Finished Acrylic Portrait

Yesterday around 11:00, I finished the Santiago's second portrait. I un-glossed the background and finished the hands. Hands are so difficult! The only part of the portrait that I'm not fond of is the hands of the youngest son. I don't think they turned out well, but I was out of time and told myself to deal with it. On both babies, the hands had a foreshortened finger and I'm not the best with foreshortening. Or hands. So it wasn't the best combination.

After I'd finished, I went back to the first painting and re-painted the eyes on the youngest boy. They were too close together and I couldn't leave it that way. It was driving me nuts. I'm glad the paintings are done and I think that they taught me a lot. They were my first canvas paintings of people. In hindsight, I wish I would have given the first painting a background, but I hope that it'll look good in their house regardless.

Jan 29th: Acrylic on Canvas

After working until 6, I didn't much feel like painting after I ate dinner. But, I knew I had a whole bunch of painting to do still, so I sucked it up. I started with the top of the portrait and worked my way down; finishing ears, skin tones, blending shirt wrinkles and fixing little things. I find that when fixing the little details, it works best to flick your eyes back and forth often between the photo and the painting. I mean, you use the photo constantly for reference, but looking at it constantly on the little details is best. It helps a lot when something isn't quite right and you don't know why.

Learning about facial dimensions this week in an art book has really helped with correcting my painting and getting the faces painted more accurately. Especially eye placement and how the nose and mouth relate to it. Unless someone has an unusual face, they all follow some of the same general placement rules. I think this knowledge will help me greatly in all my future portraits.

Jan 28th: Acrylic on Canvas

Yesterday began a slight sense of panic. Just a little thing buzzing around in the back of my head. It kept saying things like: "Oh my. Those hands aren't nearly finished..." and "You're honestly and truly going to have all this done by Sunday?!" To which I just ate another chocolate chip cookie to shut her up. As it turns out, the black paint that I used for eyes and background is shiny. Like, glossy...reflective... see your face in it shiny. No one wants that on their portrait. No one wants their kids eyes glowing everytime the light hits them. So I took a pilgrimmage to Hobby Lobby for some matte black. And some fixative for my graphite drawings, but that's another post.


So yesterday I worked mainly on the little girl's face. With some help from my fiance (who could offer good opinions since he hadn't been staring at the painting for days), I think I got her very close to the picture. I added the ribbons in her hair and color to her dress. I worked on hair. The oldest boys' hair was too dense and dark so I lightened it and made it look not so thick. Today I have to finish it. So... basically I have to finish hands, blend limbs and faces and clothes and turn shiny reflective black back to normal. Wish me some luck! I'm gonna need it!

Jan 27th: Acrylic on Canvas

I feel like I've gotten a lot done in just a few days, but that I have sooo much more to work on. Little things that all add up to making the painting incomplete. More work on clothing today. Mostly just making wrinkles. Then trying to make fingers look like fingers and legs look like legs. There's so much blending to do... so very much. Didn't get a chance to fix the little girl's face, but I will. She looks funny, I know. She's just standing in the back, looking at me saying: "When are you going to make me look like a cute little girl and not a monkey???"

Mostly, I took a lot of time making a really ugly teal background into a nice dark green that I like. I want it to look like they were in front of a green background so I put shadows behind them. The white sheet was entirely too white for such a dark background, so I'm adding grays so there isn't such a huge contrast. I don't want to make the sheet any color though. I need to add color on the flowers of the girl's dress and bows in her hair. Absolutely everything on the canvas needs to be blended. It's all pretty choppy looking, but coming together. I'll be done with this painting on Sunday no matter what.

Jan 26th: Acrylic on Canvas

There's only one way to describe how Wednesday went: Hauling ass. I sat down with a large cup of coffee, lined up 4 movies to watch and painted. And painted. And for a change of pace, painted. I moved the oldest sons' right eye over more. His eyes were too far apart. Did a little bit of tweaking with his face. Then I worked on clothing and getting the basic colors and wrinkles in there. The clothes in this painting are easy because all three of them are wearing white or mostly white shirts. The fabric that they're laying on is white also. I painted over the little girl's nose, still unhappy with it and painted in another general outline. So she looks very funky at the moment. Because I paint like a person with ADD, I began the background toward the end of the night. It was a sky blue. Once I'd finished, my fiance looked at it and gave me a thumbs down. So I painted over it with green, making a horrid teal. What I want is forest green. That's what'll go down tomorrow.

Jan 25th: Graphite Breakdowns

Yay! I'm caught up on my blogging! For the moment... Ok, so tonight I did what I hate the most. Breaking figures down into shapes. Some artists swear by this crap and insist that it works. So far... it's done nothing but confuse and frustrate me. I'd rather just draw the damn thing. However, seeing as my proportion absolutely SUCKS without a grid, I'm going to practice it regardless.

I hate breaking things into shapes because these "How to Draw" books say stuff like: "Draw three circles touching each other and three vertical lines." Which you do, and then the next frame there's a cow drawn. Yeah, the outline of a cow. From 3 circles. What...? Where's the picture of this cow so I can see how you broke the damn thing down into 3 circles! Gah! I tried drawing a face with a circle and some lines indicating where the person was looking, eye placement, etc, and ended up with probably the worst face I've ever drawn. Maybe as good as when I was five... but geez. I understand the point, I really do... but I don't think I get it. Now is the time when I really wish I could attend an art class... It's ok! Onward!

Jan 24th: Acrylic on Canvas

Mkay. Now that I didn't have a goofy looking, badly-proportioned baby on my hands, it was time to move on to the little girl. She might be the most difficult of the three. Not because she's the smallest or anything, but because of the face she's making. In the picture I'm going off of, she's not quite smiling... she's making like... a monkey face! Haha. Since she's a little baby, I understand her expression. It's so hard to paint though! Her top lip is gone entirely because she's got her lower lip pulled up. The left side is cracked into something like a smile... who knows? My main problems here are trying to make her look happy (because that clearly comes across in the photo), and not making her bottom lip look too big or like it's sticking out. Like her brothers, she's not facing completely forward either so I have to figure out how to make her nose look like it's pointing to the left.

Lots of nose problems with this painting. But it's a learning process and I'll be the better for it. I also realize that I need to go back and bring the oldest boys eyes closer together now that I'm looking at these pictures...Working late tonight so I'm not sure if I'll be able to get any painting done, but I'll definately draw something.

Jan 23rd: Acrylic on Canvas

Well, I think I got the baby back to the right ethnicity. It's amazing how different he looks now. Quite the improvement. Despite my grid, it seems that facial features are off and I'm going to have to fix them all by eyeballing it. Sigh. I was right. The baby's eyes were too close together. Once I spaced them the way they were supposed to be, things fell into place. Everything was made wider. The nose, the mouth... even the tongue. I realize that he's looking rather highlighty and undone at the moment. I really had to highlight things last night to give me the right positioning of everything. Now my task is to make sure his nose looks like it's pointing to the right and not straight on. He's going to be a happy baby once he's finished.

Jan 22nd: Acrylic on Canvas

I know what you're thinking. "Who's the asian kid?" That, my friend, is a good question. I started painting the baby in the portrait and somehow ended up with a cute little asian kid. What in the world? How did I do that??? Well, my theory is that I was painting too much without referring constantly to the photograph. Sometimes I'll paint what I think is there or what I think should be there instead of painting what's actually there. This messes everything up. Stupid brain. So, his nose and eyes are too narrow. His mouth might need to be wider as well... Mostly the nose though. The nose is wrong and therefore makes the mouth look crooked. Oi. If I widen the nose and round out the eyes, I think that this cute little asian kid could be the right ethnicity. Haha. I don't know why this painting is giving me so much grief. The one before it went pretty smoothly. Regardless, I shall push on and fix it! The painting must be done before or on January 31st so in the next few days I'm gonna rock it. Next post, I'll have the baby corrected and hopefully have started on the little girl. After this painting is finished, I'm going to try oil paint. It might be easier to get the right colors and shades with oil than acrylic. This is what my father tells me anyway.

Jan 21st: Acrylic on Canvas

Not having internet in my apartment is killing me! Especially when I don't want to make the pilgrimmage to the coffee shop or library to blog. Bleh. You don't know how much you rely on the internet until it isn't there anymore... Anyways, yesterday I painted, but not a whole lot. We hiked during the day and man was I tired. Hiking in the snow is no easy feat, but I digress. I concentrated my efforts on the only face I've started so far, the oldest boy. The other day he looked chubby and wierd, with his nose nowhere near where it should have been. Upon leaving the painting and coming back with fresh eyes, I noticed that his mouth and nose weren't as wide as they should have been. The expression lines around the corners of his mouth were in too far and needed to be moved outward. The teeth were worked on a bit but I know they need a lot more work done to them. I added lines around his eyes and thinned the jawline a little. He's looking a lot better, but still not close enough. The eyes need much more work and blending, blending, blending. Tomorrow I'll see what I can do and hopefully get some work done on one of the other kids.

Jan 20th: Graphite

Thursdays are so crazy! I had a mere 30 minutes to do some sort of art because work was so busy. Usually there's some down time, but not so much Thursday... So, I all but finished the graphite portrait of the baby. The only thing I've got left to do is some very minor blending and her left sleeve. Other than that, it's done. I worked on the wrinkles of the clothes, getting the shading the right value/shape and making it more believable. She's got tiny flowers stitched on her little dress and I wasn't going to add them, but they were so simple that I did it anyway. I just took a tortillon, smeared it around in some 8B, and made little dash flowers and stitches. They're nothing elaborate, but I think they add a lot to the drawing. Tuesday I'll finish it completely. It's still not the darkness that I'd like it... but I don't know how to make it darker without making her look dirty or another ethnicity. That'll be something that I can work on this year.

Jan 19th: Acrylic on Canvas

I don't know what my problem was last night. I would like to blame it on the sub-par lighting in the kitchen... but really, I have no idea. I started painting the oldest kid because he's in the middle and has the largest face in the painting. It took me forever to find a shade of brown for skin that wasn't horrible looking. You would think that because I'd done the previous painting, skin color would be no problem. Yeah, that's what I thought too. But there were issues. It looked purple. Then it looked Native American. Then it was too yellow and Asian looking. Oi.

Despite the fact that I used a grid, I realized that the oldest boys' nose was completely off. It was too straight. His face isn't facing forward, it's angled to the left; but I had painted the nose straight, making his face completely awkward looking. Luckily, I figured out what I'd done wrong, but I'm pretty confused why it got so messed up even with the grid. By the end of the day, I got something that's kinda, sorta, maybe like the picture... but looks nothing like the kid yet. His nose, dispite my efforts, still looks like it's facing straight on. It's the nose that makes him look so wierd! Shading's too dark and I've blended nothing. He looks like an elf or something! In short: it's a mess right now, but he's in there somewhere. I'll fix it on Friday because today I have work and karate right after. Today I expect more drawing on the baby portrait.

Jan 18th: Graphite/Acrylic on Canvas

I got more done last night than I planned, which is nice. I thought that I would be way too tired when I got home from work to really do any painting, but I was super awake for whatever reason. So, on the graphite drawing of the baby, I worked on her sleeve. It's a huge, pink, puffy thing and has a lot of wrinkles and shading. Oi! Wrinkles in clothing aren't very hard to do though and just knowing how close I am to finishing helps. It's also satifying to erase the grid lines.

Then when I got home, I laid the grid for the second Santiago family portrait. In this one, the kids are considerably younger. I did the outlines and basic facial features. I use brown just because it's not as hard to cover over as black when I find I'm a little off on something. They're creepy looking, I know, because it's so rough. But, I have to start somewhere. Tonight I'll begin adding color and depth to skin and eyes. I like this blog thing. It's cool to see the progression.

Jan 17th: Graphite

Ok blog. I'll square with you. I don't always do what I say I'm going to do. Hence, last night. We had a late night out and so, there was no painting. But fear not. As a testiment to my dedication to this blog and art in general, I still drew. I worked on the baby portrait. I only worked on the hands because I was exhausted. It took probably 30 minutes to complete the hand closest to the face. Fingers are hard. They always end up looking like hot dogs or misshapen sticks. I'm not sure why this is...

For the hand I used 3 different pencils, 3B, 8B and 6B and lightened areas up with the kneaded eraser. I like how it turned out, I think it looks how it should and I also think that I made it just the right darkness. I may have to make aspects of the face darker like hair and eyelashes just so the hand doesn't take all the focus. It won't take very long to get this one finished. The clothes have no pattern on them and just have a few wrinkles here and there. Today I get off of work at 9, which doesn't leave me much time to paint, so I'll draw some more on the down times at work. I'll lay the grid for the painting when I get home.

Jan 16th: Graphite

I would like to share how hard it is to do any kind of art when your favorite movie is playing in the background. I mean, The Empire Strikes Back has always demanded my undivided attention. Regardless, there was drawing. Basically, I kept drawing the baby's sleeve on the left over and over again... trying to figure out what the heck I did wrong. I accidentally erased part of the grid that's laid over the original photo and well... that messed up my sleeve. So I did what I could to put it right. That means taking a pencil and using it as a ruler to gauge distance and what not. That's another trick I learned from dad, although a lot of artists do it.

I got it closer, but got frustrated and decided to focus on the face instead. It was still too light so I smudged some charcoal onto the chamois and went nuts. Then I had to go back and lighten areas with my kneaded eraser and darken areas that got all smudged. Looking at it now compared to what I did yesterday... there really isn't much of a difference. I don't want to make it too dark, but I do want it to be clear that the baby's skin is a darker shade than her light pink clothes. I'll have to go back to it another time though, because today I'm going to start the Santiago's second painting.

Jan 15th: Graphite

I'm not quite ready to start the Santiago's second painting. I need to enlarge some pictures and work out some details still. So, while I'm getting motivated for all that, I started a drawing that was owed to my aunt forever ago. It's a baby portrait. She's no longer a baby... that was probably five years ago or so, but hey... better late than never. For portraits, no matter what the medium, I do a grid. (Unless it's on ornaments. I haven't been able to figure out how to grid on a curved surface yet). This lets me get proportion as exact as I can and lets me avoid someone saying things like: "That doesn't look like my kid..." behind my back.

It's been a while since I've done a graphite portrait. Generally what ends up happening is me using one of the 20 or so pencils I have and not getting much of a shading range. Sometimes, I don't even draw with fancy drawing pencils and I whip out a good ol' mechanical. This time, I want to use as many different kinds of graphite as I can. I started with the hardest graphite because it's easiest to erase and makes very light lines. The darkest shade is 8B and will only be used for the deepest shades. I got to try out chamois for shading the skin and I gotta say, it's much better than the tissues I was using in the past. It gives a nice smoothness to skin without looking streaky or like the baby's face is dirty. My main problem with portraits like these is not making the picture dark enough. So when I work on this piece, I'll focus on that. As one of my art teachers once told me concerning graphite: "Don't be afraid of the dark!"

Jan 14th: Acrylic on Canvas

I realize now that as the weekend hits, it's harder to commit to do art every day. Especially when we spend the day snowboarding or have karate or something like that. It's going to be hard, but I know I can do it if I just take an hour or so out of my busy days. Maybe I'll have to start getting up earlier.

Good news. I finished the canvas painting. Oh yes. It is finished. I'm so freaking happy. So yesterday I basically did all the little touch ups that needed to be done like the youngest boys' eyebrows. The biggest thing I did was finish everyone's hair, adding texture and highlights. I also finished painting the girls' hands. Hands are always hard for some reason, but I even got the fingernails in there so I'm happy with it. My final decision on the background was to leave it white. Every color that I could think of didn't seem right and I think that it looks good with the white. I'm very happy with the finished product and I hope the person who ordered it will be too.

Jan 13th: India Ink Pen Drawings

I was a drawing machine yesterday. Once I got started, I kept going. But I'll only post my best pictures. So here's my thing... I have issues drawing just sketches. I like detail. I like things to be as close to the original as possible. In short, I can't do abstract. I didn't practice any abstract-ness, but I did try out some gesture drawing.

Gesture drawings are done quickly. They imply movement and features with just a few lines. I don't know how much I accomplished as far as that goes. I found that I had to shade things. So I may have mixed gesture with some crosshatching... but meh. I do what I want.

I found this technique to be fun and a welcome change from my usual drawing style. It was liberating to not have to nit pick about every curve and line. Eventually my hand seemed to move on its own; it was pretty cool. My favorite is the guy with a cigarette. Smoking is bad kids... but this guy looks cool doing it anyway.

Jan 12th: Acrylic on Canvas

Yesterday my painting had to compete with the housework. The housework won. Well, that and Donnie Darko... which is a movie that I've seen 3 times now and I still don't get it. Anyways, I did paint, I swear. I worked on the dads' shirt and have a few areas left to blend, but it's otherwise done. The youngest sons' shirt is just white, but has around 4 shades of gray in it, so I worked on blending all that gray together. I also played around with a background color and can tell you right now that Black doesn't work. Not for this portrait anyway. So it's back to white. I'm stuck on the background. In the photo I'm going off of, the background is some fake tropical scene. I don't really care for it, so I'm not going to paint it. I don't want palm trees and such taking the focus off the subjects. I want a plain, dark-colored background that fades out as it gets closer to the family. I'm also leaning toward keeping it white. We'll see what happens.

Jan 11th: India Ink Pen Drawing

I had a hell of a time getting to the internet today. I drove to a coffee shop only to find that my fiance's laptop was in a mood. It kept turning itself on and off randomly before starting up. So I gave up and went to the library. That's where I spilled my $4 decaf Caramel Mountain latte all over the floor. Fabulous. But, sigh, here I am. Yesterday I managed to sketch a pen drawing. I figured, hey, I've got these fancy drawing pens... I might as well use them.

I used fine and extra fine tips. Most of it was done using the fine tip, but when I got to facial features and such, I used the extra fine. I'm not very good at crosshatching so I used this break from acrylics to practice. I also tried to break away from being so precise with it. You can't erase pen so I just sketched away and tried not to care about how perfect it was going to be. I think I did ok. It's random I know, an angel stabbing a demon... but whatever. I'm proud of her wings and the demon's face and foot. I didn't quite draw her leg right so I think it looks funny. Either way, it was an adventure in pen.

Jan 10th: Acrylic on Canvas

Super excited today because yesterday I completed painting the father's face. Ah! The pictures do it no justice! I'm happy about my blending. And, randomly, his eyebrows. I only managed to change his shirt to a slightly different shade of orange... but didn't get anything else done on it besides that. I think he looks pretty happy, doesn't he?

Speaking of shirts, I continued painting the pattern on the oldest boys' shirt and have everything done but the collar. Other than that, just some little touch ups here and there. I need to re-do the youngest son's eyebrows. They're sketchy looking and need some serious blending. At the rate I'm going, I should be done with this painting this weekend and can move onto my next canvas painting. I work late tonight, so no painting unfortunately, but I'm going to practice some drawing or another if I have any free time at work.

Jan 9th: Acrylic on Canvas

We had to cancel the internet at our apartment. Lame! So my posts are going to be a day late until we get a less expensive provider. It's all good. I'm still remaining diligent and doing art every day. Yesterday, I was having quite the time trying to figure out how to paint the pattern on the oldest child's shirt. The fabric has slight wrinkling in it which is made apparent by the white lines. The paint was giving me a hard time and would either be too light and not show up at all, or be too thick and look incredibly wrong. What I did end up with I like. I only managed to get a few stripes in, but the ones that I didn't have to paint over look pretty good. I'm pleased with the effect.

Besides struggling with shirts, I also fought with ears yesterday. I couldn't for the life of me remember how I got certain skin colors and I ended up with orange, tan, pink and yellowish ears. How fabulous. The great thing about me is that even if the color looks a little off, I'm not happy and will keep trying until I get it right. So the ears on the kids are done and I also finished shading and blending the necklines. Today I plan on finishing the father's face and continue to work on the clothing. Sorry for the delayed posts :p

Jan 8th: Acrylic on Canvas

I only had a few hours today so I worked on clothes. The girl in the back has on some difficult fabric. It's knitted or possibly some kind of lace. Either way, there are lots of tiny holes that vary in size and shape. Luckily, I have a crazy looking brush shaped like an "M" that will paint several dots simultaneously. It seems to be working so far on the white from her undershirt, but as far as the brown of her skin, it didn't look nearly as well. I don't know if that's because the brown was too dark or what, but I had to paint over the dots for tonight. I'll figure something else out tomorrow.

Tonight was about finding the right shade for the clothing and pondering a background. Since the family is in bright (almost pastel) colors, I think it would be best to use a neutral color for the background. Possibly gray or a grayish blue.

Jan 7th: Acrylic on Canvas

I have a little side business since I only work part-time. I sell custom glass ornaments and canvas paintings. People send me pictures of whatever and I'll paint it on Christmas bulbs or canvas for them. This week I'm painting the Santiago family.

I started earlier this week with the youngest boy since he's in the center. I used grid lines and lightly sketched his main features with very diluted paint. Layer by layer I built up skin color and shading. I usually take forever to do a painting like this, but that day, I was ridiculously caffienated and got three of the four faces done. I was slightly freaking out at how quickly I was painting!

Today I began work on touching up the kids' faces and working on the father. His skin color is slightly lighter than the children and I found myself struggling to find the right shade. This is my main issue with acrylics. It's very hard to find the right shade because the color changes when it dries. Eventually I found a shade that I was happy with. I heard this week that soft brushes aren't ideal for acrylics, but I'm not sure if I agree. It's the soft brushes that allow me to blend colors fairly easily.

Not as motivated (or perhaps caffienated) as I was when I began, I only got the father's face partially completed today and rudimentary shading on the kids' ears. I also began to realize that I hadn't laid down a background... which is probably something I should have started with. Also, I paint in such a random order... the clothing hasn't even been started. Not sure why I wanted the faces all done first. I'm just wierd. So far, I'm happy with how it's turning out.

Here We Go

It's not the first day of the new year, but it is my first day of my commitment to art. Really, the purpose of this blog is to rid me of my laziness; to do something creative and constructive every day no matter how tired I'm feeling. I want to get better and faster with my work because really, I'm completely an amateur. My techniques at best are sketchy (pun completely intended) and questionable at times. My biggest issues: I suck at perspective, proportion and am super slow. I get by with grids and general eyeballing if it's a good day, but I'm not satisfied. I can't afford art classes right now, so I intend on teaching myself. Whether that be through repetition, internet lessons, experimenting with media...whatever. I can do it. Let's see where this all goes.