Update #1: First attempt at selfportrait

[Vincent]

This is my first attempt at a Selfportrait, here's what i got so far, i'm planning on giving it a classic feel to it, so the yellow outline is gonna go, and i'll add a neck and slight textures.



I'm painting it grayscale, and then coloring over it, above is just a color test, here's the grayscale:


here's the Ref (yes i gave meself cloudstylohair)
http://members.lycos.nl/vincentbisschop/Vince-ref.jpg

And here's another take on the colorpalet:
http://members.lycos.nl/vincentbissc...-pre-color.jpg

Crits, tips and opinions MUCH appreciated!

-Vince

EDIT 1: added a new update on the gray image.

[Ive]

hey, nice piece. wonder why left the highlight on the chin, and lips,
also from your reference the eyes are way bigger

take care

[Cookiedough]

Hmm.. i don't see the resemblance. Your features are way more pronounced then what you drew. The shape of your face is totally different in the portrait. Your nose is rounder in the photo and (not to be mean) a bit bigger. Your chin is also a bit bigger and rounder in the photo and you have a bigger forehead then the portrait. Nothing wrong iwth artistic freedom and all, but i just don't see the resemblance anymore.

The portrait seems rather flat now. It's too smooth and doesn't really show volume. Spend more time on the area around the mouth, cos your face has so much going on there and that's all flat in the SP. You got some great cheekbones and some very pretty lashes, but it just doesn't show.

I don't know if you can improve the original version or if it'd be wiser to redo this. I do like the colorpallette you're considering, though i prefer the colors you posted. The linked version is too purple imo.

Hope to see the progress of this pic soon.

[Vincent]

Originally Posted by Cookiedough

Hmm.. i don't see the resemblance. Your features are way more pronounced then what you drew. The shape of your face is totally different in the portrait. Your nose is rounder in the photo and (not to be mean) a bit bigger. Your chin is also a bit bigger and rounder in the photo and you have a bigger forehead then the portrait. Nothing wrong iwth artistic freedom and all, but i just don't see the resemblance anymore.

The portrait seems rather flat now. It's too smooth and doesn't really show volume. Spend more time on the area around the mouth, cos your face has so much going on there and that's all flat in the SP. You got some great cheekbones and some very pretty lashes, but it just doesn't show.

I don't know if you can improve the original version or if it'd be wiser to redo this. I do like the colorpallette you're considering, though i prefer the colors you posted. The linked version is too purple imo.

Hope to see the progress of this pic soon.

Thanks a bunch! your right, i kept painting and doing stuff on this one, and i started to paint blindly, i did look back every second of it, but the resemblance didn't show up the way i wanted to.
Indeed my nose i much rounder, i'll try to flesh that out.
The mouth area is my biggest problem, its kinda vague on the photo, and i'm kinda new to this.
I'll have a new look on this tonight or tommorow, i'll post the progress and pay extra attention to the area's you mentioned, thanks!

[Firefly]

What's with the lighting change? I would say if this is your first portrait you should use a reference photo that's just what you want the final to be. Trying to adapt a bad photo as well as get everything else right is a big undertaking for a beginner.

You need to study the planes of the head and the skull underneath. In your painting you've put a bright light on the forehead and smoothed it out. It looks like a ball now. Look at your reference. You have a brow ridge there. There's bone structure going on under there. It's what shadows the eyes, and defines the top of the nose. So look at things like that. Also the bone structure of the eye sockets, the nose and the chin.

And put a neck on you. This floating head thing is odd. Alot of the shape of the jaw is implied by the shadows that are around it on the neck. Put in your shirt too. That dark line of the shirt is a good way to give your chin definition.

[Vincent]

Okay, here's an update, it still sucks, and the more i look at it and the ref, the more it looks off aargh, but atleast now i see it doesn't look like the ref, tho i have the feeling it looks like me haha, here it is, i'm afraid i'm gonna have to redo the whole thing.. the lower lip looks like bleh, my whole cheekline and chin should be lower etc..



But thanks alot for all the great crits, i tried to fix quite some pointers, still not enough..
But it was a great excersize for what it was. perhaps if some think it's still worth finishing i'll finish it.
I could allways finish it as a picture based on my face haha.

[rasdasa]

the highlite on the tip of the nose is much too obtrusive. also, take to heart what some of the previous posters wrote, and pay attention the planes of the head, it just doesn't seem to have the the proper divisions/breaks at the moment. Not a bad attempt, but try to do another one flipping th pic upside down and painting a new portrait upside down. Just try to see the shapes and plane breaks, not the nose, chin, etc.