I received some positive responses via email regarding the Bloody Bed Head portrait recently posted. Since yesterday was New Year's Eve, I didn't have time to work on much. . .so here is another portrait from the past that (to me) is a solid example of illustrative skill paired with cheap materials. Artists—you have no excuses if you think you "cannot afford" art materials. The image above may only be 4x4 (inches) however, it was COMPLETELY created with marker, pen and correctional fluid (White Out®) then (slightly) cleaned up in Photoshop (only because I spilled water on part of it).
I do not have the original reference picture but I do remember that the image I used was of a slightly distraught little girl (around age 5-6) that I took at a wedding—you wouldn't know that from what I turned it into. I remember making subtle tweaks to push the image toward being more creepy and mysterious like stretching the forehead wider, reducing the size of the chin and playing with the size and placement of the eyes within the art space. I did actually take this image and try to recreate a larger version on canvas, however, it didn't have the strength of the original small/marker/roughness and ended up looking a bit blah. I can't explain it but (in the larger version) the mystery was gone.
When I do portraiture and use a photo reference the challenge for me is to transform it into something new by pushing it to be something it never was OR accenting an emotional element that I imagine there to be. Ultimately, I aim for likeness but make it my own art piece (unless I am aiming for a very traditional "tribute" style).Labels: TRADITIONAL PORTRAIT
