FPM Painting #6: Kasey, color-y!

Fall Portrait Marathon, Painting #6: Kasey

Kasey - work in progress
acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"
© Xan Blackburn, 2011

Tightened up some of the darks, corrected a little around the nose-ball, and did some more of the subtle shading on his neck and the shadowed side of his face.  


Then I dove in with some color.  The pink mouth and ears are pretty intense, but there are layers to go on top that will bring them into the right tones and values (colors and light/dark, in Artspeak).  


The leafy background is glazed with a Chrome green light, which I need to get more of.  There will be a lot of toning down on that as well, with darker, less saturated greens.  Putting in this bright green at this stage will give it the sense of being mottled with sunshine, later.  


Okay, what's next?
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Continuing the background by glazing in some dark Hooker's Green, particularly in the areas I most want dark, keeping it thinner where I want some sunlight to make the leaves glow a bit.  Careful about edges around Kasey's complicated ears, and ruff.  

Kasey - work in progress
acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"
© Xan Blackburn, 2011

I took some cyan (basic blue), thinned it way down and glazed it in on the shadowed side of his face and neck, even up into his ears, and into his mouth.  There is a lot of blue in the mouth color, believe it or not.  I used some white, thinned with glaze, to smooth out some of the harder edges of the shading, and will do more working back and forth like that.  Still not going in for the highest white highlights  I used some raw umber (very dark brown) to toast up the color in Kasey's fawn spots, just around the very edges, where he has some darker hair mixed in.  I used the same raw umber to add another layer to his eye color, and to warm and darken some of the mouth, even on the teeth.  Some areas of the ears got some of the burnt umber, too.  Most of the remaining work in the ears will be tight hair-by-hair highlights. 


The nose-ball needed some more corrections, so I bravely worked in some deeper darks, then a very light touch with some highlighting around the nostrils and on the top edge.  


Now, it's details, details, details!