My Family Present From Me.

[Simplistics]

I took this photo last Sunday (12-21-03), and is a picture of my just-over-one-year-old niece, Shaela and my newest nephew, Conner (my other brother's baby- his first) which he is two weeks old.
My sister in law was holding Conner, and Shaela was really curious, and she wanted to get into the action, so she hopped into her mom's lap and wanted to hold Conner. She was really sweet and gentle with him, patting his blankets, kissing his face. It was really cute. So I got a picture of her doing this and I had this crazy idea to paint this moment for my family for Christmas.

http://home.comcast.net/~sinemesis/artwork/shaeandconner3.jpg

I think I'm greatly improving on my painting time... and overall skill. :)

[Al Ian]

The skin tones and anatomy look perfect. I love the expression on the face of the little girl. Did you work from a refference?

The only thing is your kids dont seem round. The values dont go far enough.

[Simplistics]

I worked from a photo reference.
I initially sketched it out while having the reference there, then as soon as I was done, I lined the photo up and fixed any major problems with the sketch.

Then I worked with the reference to the right of me the whole entire time.

I think why they don't look "round" is because I didn't use black as a color. Since the background was dark and the flash was on there were the usual flash shadows that I just didn't want to put in the picture.

[Al Ian]

That might be part of it. This is what I was talking about when it comes to the values are different.

http://jmarkey77.home.bresnan.net/images/wip/shaeandconner3.jpg

The darks of your kids are the same value (different tone, which is how its supposed to be.) However the lights are vastly different. Making the baby (Conner I assume) seem flat. While the tones on Shae give her depth and value. Does that make more sence?

[Simplistics]

Yes, thanks for explaining that in more depth.

Unfortunately, I've already printed them out and gave them to my family (which they LOVE). But I'll keep that in mind on my next picture I work on.