I’ve completed this pencil portrait of Audrey and Janeice, matted it and have it wrapped in and ready to present to Audrey today at Church. I’m not sure if all my little modifications are even noticeable to you, the eyes, a bit more blending in the skin tone and deepening, I’ve tweaked both of their noses – little things that seemed off to me as I kept looking back and forth from their photo to the drawing.

Here’s the piece matted and I’ve signed the matboard and it’s ready to drop into a frame, just in time for Christmas.

It’s been a busy week here in the studio, I’ve tried to get away a couple of times to get some Christmas shopping done – I’m so glad I can do so much of it online! Today I’ll be getting another piece ready, I’ll be drawing a brindle Pit Bull named Josie over the next week. I’ll also put together my Handmade Gift Exchange packages (Catie joined in on the fun, and her gift is just so cute!), get a hundred or so Christmas cards and postcards addressed, and attend the girls Church Christmas Program later on in the evening.

If you’re on Facebook – I did get the girls Piano Recital videos uploaded to my wall – go have a peek if you haven’t already, I’m so proud of them!

I hope you’re all doing well – and that you’re getting everything in order for the Holiday without panic! It always seems there’s less and less time every year, doesn’t it?

Another graphite pencil portrait that I’ve been working on, Audrey and Janeice. I started yesterday with penciling in the facial features and general outline – it’s pretty light but you get the idea of how getting these proportions is crucial as I’m working in the shading.

I started with Audrey, working left to right across the piece. Most of these progress shots are pretty rough, and even now I am still in my contemplating stage with the portrait since I notice things every time I look at it that need just a bit of tweaking.

Just like my previous portrait, I get the details down, shade in a medium value, and then return to blend, darken, and lighten or lift the pencil.

Audrey is all sketched in, now I’ll bring in the blender (a tortillion) and lighten with either a kneaded eraser or for this portrait, I’ve used a pink pencil-top eraser as the areas are much smaller and require a fine edge eraser.

Audrey’s portrait is blended now, though I’ll keep returning to it to make minor changes.

Moving on, I’ve begun Janeice’s portion of the portrait, roughing in those medium values.

Darkening in the hair, skin tones – her skin tone is really dark at this point so I lift a lot of that shading off with the kneaded eraser blend, and lift more.

This is the latest photo, and at this point I’ve gone ahead and signed the portrait and I’m calling it complete, however I am still going back every half hour or so and re-evaluating, making more tweaks as needed. I’ll post the final scan in my portfolio.

I’ve completed Jerry’s portrait and received the proof approval from my client, so this piece is now officially complete!

Much has changed since my last update, I’ve blended a medium tone over his whole face, then lightened and deepened further to get those final details. It’s turned into a very artistic yet lifelike rendering that I’m pleased to sign my name to!

I’m still working on a few other projects as well, another drawing, an illustration – and two blog/site design clients to button up before Christmas. Can you believe how fast the days are going by?!

I’m sharing a few stages of Jerry’s portrait with you today. Above, you can see I’ve already worked in his hair and have moved along to the left side of his face to work in the shadows. Initially, I’ll start with a medium value and work either lighter or darker depending on where I’m going in the portrait. I’m wearing a cut up sock (isn’t it cuuuuute) to keep the oils on my hands to myself and to prevent my wrist and hand from smearing the graphite.

Still working in facial features, darkening in the creases, browline, right eye.

Here I’ve got the portrait pretty well drawn in. I’ll go back with my eraser pencil (yes, it’s a pencil with eraser instead of lead, one of my favorite pencils!!) and also darken and lighten further. I’ll use my blender pencil (if there’s a cool pencil to be found, I’ve probably got one) to really give that depth and dimension to the finished portrait.

Overall, I’m very pleased with his portrait. It’s been a while since I’ve worked a two-legged creature (as June put it) and I rather enjoy the challenge!

I’m working on this graphite portrait for a client for Christmas – he’s a handsome fella, isn’t he? This shot was taken on his wedding day, such a warm loving look on his face – of course he was sharing that look with his bride!

So far I’ve lightly penciled in his features and just started working on his hair. I’ll post more photos as I progress.

 

I have tossed around the idea of painting on webcam again, especially since I’m working on so many portraits at the moment. I’ll definitely let you know if I decide to do that and give you a link so you can pop in and watch me painting live in my studio.

Yesterday I decided to just snap photos of Claire’s portrait as I progressed and show you all of the stages I go through during a drawing session. If you’re looking for a tutorial on how to draw a portrait, I’m not sure that I am a very good teacher – but if you pick up more on visual cues, you’ll be good to go.

My supplies are very simple – an Ebony extra smooth drawing pencil, a set of Kimberly drawing pencils (a nice variety of hard and soft leads for shading and defined lines), a white block eraser, a kneaded eraser, sharpener, acid free archival drawing paper and a sock, so you don’t get yourself too messy during the process.

I started out measuring and marking the size, 4″ x 6″ on my pad, and worked in the line drawing:

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Many, many portrait sketches = lots and lots of art to create this week!

Here’s what’s on my easel:

Badger is a certified therapy dog, she is allllways happy. I love that she’s smiling for her portrait. This will be an 8×8 oil portrait.

This is Morris, an orange tabby who recently crossed over the rainbow bridge.  He’ll also be done in oils, on a 6×6 canvas.

I’ve painted Callie before, but this portrait of her will have much more meaning since it is in loving memory.  Another 6×6 oil portrait.

Simba is a stunning orange tabby. Also in oil on 6×6 chunky wrapped canvas.

 

This yellow-sided green cheeked conure is Kiwi, she’s also having a 6×6 oil portrait. Kiwi and Boo (below) belong to Lisa’s daughter – these are a birthday surprise. So ssssh.

Boo was a beautiful parrotlet that passed away, her portrait pairs with Kiwi’s in 6×6.

This pose of Claire is just gorgeous, big curls falling down into her face – this is the line drawing for a 4×6 graphite drawing that All Adither won in January for giving me the bestest birthday wish.

After – I dunno, a lifetime of doodling on random things like kleenex, napkins, placeholders, envelopes or any piece of scrap paper I could get my hands on, I finally bought some Moleskine sketchbooks to carry around in my purse with me. Brilliant, right? It’s about time. It takes me a while to catch on, what can I say.

Yesterday while we were out, I decided to take out my moleskine, and the sock I wear on my hand (which made some people raise their eyebrows), and doodle. But what to doodle? I was lost for a minute. The kids went off to play, and I closed my eyes to see if I could “see” anything in there that I wanted to doodle – but nothing. I needed to doodle. CRAVED it. Especially since I will be drawing and painting all week next week. Getting back in the saddle, that’s what it was really all about.

So, what do you doodle when your mind is blank? You doodle what’s in front of you, that’s what.

This is the first page, how’d I doodle? Can you tell where we were, without looking at the “title”?

A long wait in the hospital waiting room, a box of pencils and a hand held sharpener. I worked Moggie’s second pencil portrait, a 6″ x 6″ piece to compliment her first portrait – which I finalized as well, adding whiskers and her name to her tag.

I’ll add a new scan of her first portrait behind the cut if you’d like to see that one in it’s finished state.

I’m offering these graphite portraits at $2 per square inch, which is a really nice price for an original piece of artwork. If you’re interested in having a graphite/pencil piece done, please get in touch with me through my “contact” form (linked in the top menu).

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