My First Self-Portrait

This is the picture I used to paint from--

I changed the picture to sepia so you could see the lights and darks--

This is my first ever attempt at a self-portrait.

I am taking an online watercolor "faces" course and this is what I painted tonight.

I used a picture of me taken 48 years ago.

I can see a likeness.

Unfortunately it is in not in Picture 1--(see picture 1 below)

Wonder why I was so light and free on the right side of my face and so heavy-handed on the left--??

However, what is so interesting is this--the right side (Picture 1) doesn't really look too much like me.

The left cartoonish side is very much like me.

By the way, I added a touch of pink but we were supposed to paint this all in one color--seeing how many variations of that one color we could use within the picture--teaches you about lights and darks--

I see that I was very kind to myself--made the face thinner--do you see that my eyebrows are turned the wrong way?? (in my real picture above)--they are fairly thin now in my old age but they were very thick at the end that was supposed to be thin and vice versa--not being critical--I actually liked them okay BUT I didn't get them right in the portrait and I thought I was making them so heavy where my actual eyebrow was heavy BUT I didn't!

This is picture 1--wow!  I love the shading right under her eye--don't ask me how I did that--I think the water and color just did it!

Picture 2

The good news is this--I think the watercolor course is a good one--the picture above is one I painted last night before I started the watercolor class today.  I think I can tell a difference.

The picture I painted last week of the girl was acrylic--quite different than painting watercolor--you can let acrylics dry and paint over them--

teeth are hard--I've got to learn a lot more about teeth--


© all photographs and text property of Dianne Hogue unless otherwise noted