Thanks to all of you for your kind responses, words can't express what it means to have such an elite group take time to offer your thoughts on my work.

Mike: This was one of those occasions where I felt the drawing was working out pretty accurately from the outset - in other words, I didn't spend a lot of time moving features around, this doesn't happen with me very often by the way. I started the drawing with a value 3 grey to get everything in it's proper location and then went to a value5 to sort of "nail down" the specifics. After this point I laid in the darks, middle tones in the lower 1/3 of the face and worked my way up.

Sharon: For the basic flesh tone I used a mixture of Cad. Rd. Lt, yellow ochre, a small amount of cerulean blue and titanium white. The darks were initially burnt sienna, veridian green, cadmium orange and white. I also used chromium oxide green in some of the shadow areas.

As far as the drawing I used the relative size method. I usually open my hand and place it on the canvas and create two marks with my brush, one at the end of my "pinkie" finger and one at the end of my thumb. This will give me the 10" I need for the head size. From there I make a vertical/horizontal axis as a staring point for the features. The model was sitting in front of a window in my studio.

Linda: That sounds like something I would like to try, I think I'll do that for my next painting. I have been doing these 3 hour paintings primarily for two reasons: 1) help me loosen up 2) to be as accurate as I possibly can with each brush stroke. So many times I find myself applying paint and saying to myself , "If it isn't exactly correct I'll fix it later".

Mike, thanks for showing the progression of your work. I love the bold drawing you started with and the quick application of color. There is allot to learn when a painting is posted like this, thanks.

Vianna Szabo

Vianna,

Thanks for you kind words. It's nice to know that after all the help I've been getting here over the past few years that maybe I can help someone too.

I wanted to show a few more steps here but I found myself getting caught up in the painting and forgetting about the camera.

Very nice Mike!

I wish more of us would post these kinds of progression photos - it's great to see how everyone else works.