Took your advise....

Bronco

howdy all

Well after my contribution to the "release the heads" thread I decided to take the advise of you guys and try and get my lighting and a solide color pallete for faces.

So i did a face study on my own ugly mush,which can be seen below.as you can see strong light comes in from the right of the image. I thought this was good as I can practice getting the trasition between light and dark right as well as the color tones that represent them.

I also attached a strip of my method to create the image,credit goes to my good friend The badger for the quick light/dark paint over in the inital phrase.

Any comments/suggestions are most welcome.I stress I was concentrating on the lighting/tone aspect rather than a true likeness but comments on that aswell are most welcome also.

Thanks all

john

EDIT:- UPDATE BELOW!!

rooster

hey looks cool, like it a lot. I think lighting and tone are pretty important to likeness really, but I see what youre saying. There are a few areas that stick out to me though that if you fix would really improve this piece. I think the best way to make them out is if you squint and compare the photo to the digital one.

I think some areas of your shading are too heavy, distorting the shapes- ones that stick out the most to me are the centre neck, the shading coming down from your right nostril (fades out more towards the mouth) and the lips, which i think should be a little fuller and less red & contrasted. Also the tshirt looks a lot heavier contrasted and saturated than the photo, i'd tone it down. Having said all that painting from real life is hard and this is definately a good attempt.
Hope to see some updates!

usagi

that is looking way better than the last painting you showed me (you know who i am right? pastymesa @ hotmail.com on msn). it still looks kinda flat and i think and your shading could be more subtle. youre definitely improving though. much tighter than before. the eyebrow and forehead look especially nice

Badname

Hey Bronco m8, like usagi said great improvement!
You could maby use some noise overlay tough to give it more texture.
And about the shirt you should stop useing your white highlights too much, just use some lighter greens but not too white.

Bronco

hey guys

Yeah thanks for the feedback.

Rooster:- Luckily this time I havent made the schoolboy error of flattening the .psd and saving it,so hopefully ill be able to make those adjustments you suggested and see how it comes out.

usagi:- thanks for the kind words mate..

Badname:- As it happens I did try adding some overlays to make the surface more "real" and inconsistent as i know for a fact my face has more potholes than the average upperclass golf course ...however I decided not to becuase I didn't want to be distracted from my initial lighting/colour study.

Bronco

Here is an update,ive adjusted the chin,neck and area under the nose abit..ive also toned things down abit and adjusted the shirt.

Hope you dig

john

rooster

cool cool, a definite improvement I would say- nice one! This gets me in the mood to do some more self portraits too..

SaToSaN

The only crit I have is the transition from the hair to the forehead seems to sharp. Add smoothing where the roots of the hair meet the scalp in the front. Other then that, great work.

DarthRevanII

I agree with Satosan...the transition is pretty sharp...it just doesnt seem realistic...also whats with the hair in the middle that just comes down? is that how your hair really is? Not trying to insult, it just seems a bit odd lol

Secondly, the shade of color on your lips is too dark...lighten it up a bit

Thirdly, i dont agree with the dark shadow you have on your chin and on the bottom of your cheeks...the picture ref you have doesnt have it, so i dont see why you have it there?

Lastly, i think you have too much emphasis on your cheeks and the line from the corners of your mouth to your nose is way too defined...your drawing makes you look a bit fatter than you aren't...lighten that up a bit and curve it a bit more

Other than that it is pretty kick ass man...i really need to work on my texture work..*sigh*