"Glance" - painted in the studio November 2007
1.) With struggle, once in a great while there comes breakthrough...I didn't struggle with this piece, but rather, it's the breakthrough...I'm afraid these photos won't really show what it is that I'm so thrilled about, but I'll try to explain. I was (and really still am) having trouble getting really light, bright yellows and oranges without them going "dead" when mixed with Titanium white. Of course, I may be aiming at "unreal" color anyway...that said, in my struggle to get brighter, cleaner, really light yellows and oranges, I decided to try some Zinc white in place of the Titanium. I have never used it before and reasoned that since it was less opaque than Titanium, it might not "kill" the color so much. Well, it kind of does, but I discovered a translucency that I wanted to try in the painting of skin. SCORE! This works like a charm! When I underpaint in a cool tone, such as green (shown above) and then paint my skin tones mixed with Zinc white, a wonderful, cool skin tone is acheived. Then, when I paint a warmer, lighter skin tone mixed from the super opaque Titanium and apply that on top I acheive a beautiful luminosity of the skin...follow along and hopefully you can see in these shots.
2.) I underpainted my typical warm tone everywhere else besides where I wanted to paint the figure. I do my rough drawing into the paint and then start in defining my darkest darks which in this case are mostly in the background.
3.) I work pretty quickly blocking in my major shapes. I redraw the eyes as I was unhappy with my initial placement of them - they were a bit too low.
4.) Now I get to use my Zinc white skin tone. You can see above (especially in the areas next to the unfinished underpainting) how that cool green really bleeds through. In the brighter, warmer areas, you can see how that Titanium mix really does the job covering. I don't have far to go as this piece is more of a study than a portrait, so, click here if you would like to see the finished piece...
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