I was so fascinated by Florence Lee's lesson incorporating the ground color into the painting as an integral part of the skintones that I decided to try another one this week; and I have a third one I want to paint as well, though that one may take a back seat to a couple of other lessons I have missed.
If you are interested in the exact (and exacting) technique, you can scroll back one post and read all about it. I got caught up today and forgot to take process photos; but again, you can see some in my previous post.
This one wasn't quite as successful, I don't think, as my first one; and ironically I think that's because I painted last week's from a black and white photo, while this week's reference was in color. The black and white assisted me to not add too much color but only focus on the darks and lights, with a few accent colors for eyes, cheeks, and lips and some dramatic highlights. I love the photo I used this week, but the model has really specific skintones, and I found myself filling in too much instead of leaving things to be suggested, with the result that I actually had to go back and re-introduce the ground color into the nose, cheeks, and around the eyes, because I had painted too much of it out. The model's red hair also caused me to put too much detail into the hair instead of letting it be a suggestion, with the result that it feels a little fussy to me.
This is, again, gesso, charcoal, and acrylic paints on a birch board, 11x14 inches. "Redhead Bride" is her name.
