Breezy sketches

A few more from recent times... sketches in various media. All are on A3 size pages. I'm grateful to the photographers for the ref images - this helps a lot with my education.

Charcoal

Charcoal

Water-soluble crayon

Water-soluble crayon

Conte

Water-soluble crayon with watercolor background

The worst of the lot perhaps... I was having a severe cold with tears running down my face
and couldn't really care what I was sketching, hence the lop-sided facial structure. The
charcoal dust wasn't helping either :/

Water-soluble crayon

Water-soluble crayon

I've taken permission for use of the ref images wherever I could. For the others, where the source is known to me, I mention/credit the source for my studies. In any case these are all used under Fair Use Guidelines. Please let me know if you'd need anything changed. Thank you!

Ref images (in order of placement) by - manovich-art, moosicman45, aol810 (twice), ratravarman, wotan56, Mcop, prettygood89, larryhoth (all are ID's from Deviantart).

First figure try with gouache

My first figure attempt with gouache. Obviously, leaves much to be desired as I continue to struggle with this medium that I've just picked up. A few, non-figure works can be seen here, here, here and here (all still-lives).

I'm a little flummoxed by gouache - started on a cheap, beginner's set from Daler Rowney in which the colors are bright, but coverage power leaves something to be desired, esp the white one. But then, I don't blame the brand... I'm at least getting some idea about it owing to this set. I don't know what I was expecting... perhaps the opacity of acrylics? Well, I'm sure the artists or designers set from the same brand would be adequately opaque.

But, the problem/vexing issue is not really that - its about how the colors seem to change in value when it dries. The darker ones seem to get lighter, and the lighter ones darker! And seems like that is the nature of gouache itself, and I've to get used to it, and continue to paint with an eye to the near future, accommodating for value changes. Nevertheless, Its a wonderful medium for preparing quick color layouts of more definitive pieces you may have in your mind, with say acylic or oil.

9" x 12", on cold pressed watercolor paper.

 Ref image by Grace Lick (mum-stock in DA).  

Portraiture Construction Lines

This video shows the basic construction lines used in drawing a portrait, as per Andrew Loomis' guidelines. I posted this on wetcanvas, art website, in response to a query posted by member scoobydoo on how to get a likeness in portraiture. Software used to paint digitally - Mypaint, and to screencapture - Camstudio.

Direct link to Youtube (in case you can't see it full screen in here)

I'm thankful to the late, great Mr Loomis for his insight, to scoobydoo and her daughter (subject of the portrait, from pic kindly posted by scoobydoo), and to the orchestra (snippet played at the end of this video) - I have no idea who they are, and would love to learn and gratefully acknowledge if I could.

Study of form in conte

A3, conte with some watercolor for background.

Reference study based on the work of photographer YmodeMilan in DA, under Fair Use guidelines... many thanks!