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More killer stuff! Can’t believe you’ve never done pen before. I wish I was that talented.
Natasha, you’re doing great work studying here and I can see your portraits improving. Keep up the good work. Here are a couple of notes. One is about using wide angle reference images and the other is about light.
Thanks, @katkoteneva and @erikdennes . . . talent ran out years ago, now it’s stubborn practice, practice, practice. The courses are helping a lot.
Thanks, @joshuajacobo that’s pretty cool . . . what I couldn’t see before, now seems obvious. Is there a specific course that helps with addressing these issues? I’m sourcing free images, but I could try to be choosier.
You’re welcome. No course that I know of when it comes to the images. With the NMA image library we try to minimize those kinds of problems but all photography has issues of some kind. Drawing from life and learning the construction and proportions of subject matter (practicing perspective as well) will help you to see when things are off over time.
@joshuajacobo thanks for mentioning that. I often forget to poke into the library. I’m participating with a group where we all work off the same photo so I’m not often in control of choosing the photo, but I’ll see if I can get them to use the library more. Thanks again!
Forgive me while I try to play catch-up. I’m actually on day 50 of the challenge! I just decided really late in the game to start posting here. This is 16, 17, 18, 19, 20. Two steps forward, one step back, am I right? lol
The first one is pencil, then two in pastel, pencil again (a copy of John Singer Sargent’s…I was trying to see if I could match his cross-hatching), and lastly, pastel again but I was forcing myself to not blend and describe the form with the weight of the strokes.
No 21. I just had to talk about this one because it was before I had gotten to Iliya’s neck and shoulders demonstration. And though I still haven’t memorized the names of anything, I can see what’s wrong, especially with the clavicles. So it is sinking slowly in. Makes me want to go back and rewatch that lesson.
Slowly, slowly getting through the Russian figure course. There’s something not quite right about her but I can’t put my finger on it and I can’t seem to capture that magic that Iliya adds to his drawings.
Here I’m trying to recreate what I learned in Iliya’s course while it’s still fresh, but it’s easier to copy a master than to apply it to your own work. I’m hoping practice will somehow make it sink in. I’m still amazed at how Iliya disappears his lines and shortcuts his reflected light.
And then I decided to try a mixed-media aaaaaannnnnnd *pfft…..disaster. I really messed up on the neck. No 24
No 25. Getting back on track. When I’m super busy, I resort to pencil because I can whip it out much faster.
No. 26. I wanted to explore some different lighting and thought some backlighting would be a nice challenge.
I spent a ridiculous amount of time on this but still could not achieve the sensitivity to the subject matter that Iliya does. Laying so much shading at the beginning is wildly different than I’m used to so requires a leap of faith. The good news is that I’m starting to understand the planes of the head a lot better.
Wow! This looks incredible! I am so impressed with all of your portraits as well as your versatility with different media. I’m working through the same course but haven’t gotten to this lesson yet. I’m looking forward to it, though, and you’ve definitely inspired me! I can totally relate to your comment that it’s easier to copy a master than to apply their techniques to your own work. I feel like I know what I’m doing when I follow Iliya in real time during his lessons, but then when I try to draw the same way on my own I realize how incredibly far I have to go. I know that’s a level I will never reach, but at least I know more than I did when I started NMA! Once again, great work!
No 28, 29, 30, 31 just truckin’ along. Like I mentioned before, I’m actually on number 5o something so I’m trying to get caught up here. One thing I’ve been working on is trying to accomplish more with pencil/pen strokes than with blending. That’s why switching to pen has been hard but the challenge has been fun. The fourth image here was a speed run and I probably spent no more than 20 minutes on it.
No 34. I have always had an aversion to charcoal…it’s so messy, out of control, unforgiving…until now. This is the most fun with charcoal I’ve ever had. I worked hard to follow Iliya and mass in the general shapes first with big swipes of charcoal. Towards the end of the demonstration, I was no longer following along and just watching his subtler development. This particular portrait differs from my others in that this one is 18×24…much larger than the others in my 7×10 sketchbook.
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