Moria (Girl with a crystal earring)
 

This is the final incantation demo I developed during the two week workshop I just returned from in Atlanta. Moria is a belly dancer who also models for artists. It was a real joy to paint her. To me the success of a painting rests on the artist's ability to capture light and life. I mostly focused on her head (it was a portrait workshop after all.) I do wish I had a little more time in order to do some additional work on the rest of her.

I documented the entire progression of the painting and will be posting it in the not too distant future. For now, here are some shots of the final painting.

Amazing
 

Marvin,

Another amazing portrait by you! I am looking forward to seeing the photos of the in-progress stages, thank you in advance for posting them.

Joan

Marvin,

It's hard to believe you paint like this with a throng of people asking you a question a second - it's beautiful and I know the model wants it!

Denise

I think the color of these may be a little off so I'm reposting them Sharon. The color of the photos I take with my Nikon D70 appear much too yellow when I bring them into Photoshop, so I may have over corrected them to try to compensate.TYhey aren't really blueish. I guess I've still got plenty of fiddling around to do. Also I have a Mac so I want them to look good on PC's as well. The weird thing is that they print out perfectly on my printer.

Denise, I've done so many demos that I'm pretty immune to distractions The only thing that does distract me is if someone is close to me and in my peripheral vision. At this point I'm not interested in selling my demo but someone in the workshop did want to purchase it.

Marvin,

I am so sorry I missed this in person. How I would have loved to have been watching over your shoulder on this one.

I was ready to go to bed but I find myself studying this. I keep going back to the close up you posted. It looks like I could reach in and actually follow the form of her face with my finger.

I love it. I absolutely love it.

The increased color saturation (and sharpening?) really brings her to life. I particularly like the variation in colors that you have in her face, more reds, blues and yellows than I've seen in your other pieces. Beautiful. Does the background contain blue? If so, is some of that same blue mixture on the cheek and neck in shadow and under her eyes? Or is that a mixture of black and white?

Given that we have similar Nikon digital cameras, it's interesting that your digital images appear to yellow. Mine are always too red (warm) on my monitor and printer, and I have to increase the blue and green channels in the levels in Photoshop, as well as decrease the red saturation. It can be so frustrating when prints don't match the monitor. I seem to remember that you calibrated your monitor with a hardware/software package, but the package didn't work on your printer?

Holly

Value question
 

Hi Marvin,

Just out of curiosity, what value would you assign her forehead or cheek? And what value to the shadow side of her face or under her neck? Somehow you have made her seem so lifelike and 3 dimensional, but the value range within her face doesn't seem so large . . . at least not when compared to the dark value of her hair.

I guess I thought this type of 3-dimensionality was accomplished through a wide range of values, but you seem to have done it without that large range. You'll probably tell me you did this with changes in temperature? That's what I keep reading on the forum, but I am yet to understand how this can work.

Thank you for any light you can shed on this,

Joan

Joan, the values in her face range from almost white (value 9 3/4) down to almost black (value 1 in her nostril) and black (value zero) in her pupils. I'd say that's a pretty good range. The cheek value averages about 3 1/2. Her right cheek and forehead average around 8, not counting the highlights. The scumbling adds great translucency and provides much depth. Keeping the values massed is the key. In other words, separating the the light and shadow values. This provides strength of form. I am not the least bit concerned with color temperature changes due to the ambiguity of those terms. I feel that identifying the hue, value and chroma of each color shape is much more precise for me.

Holly there are no blues used in the light. No black mixed with white. Just neutrals. When warm lights are scumbled over warm darks the resulting colors look cool. The background contains ultramarine blue in the scumble mixture and that same mixture was added to create the reflected light in the shadows. The reflected light under her chin is about a fifth value at the lightest point.

My monitor is perfectly calibrated except for when I'm using Photoshop. In Photoshop everything appears too yellow. The prints I make are stunningly real, relative to the colors of what I'm photographing, even though I print out of Photoshop. The Nikon Capture software appears too yellow as well, but the color is perfect in the Nikon View software. Go figure!?!

HA!

Marvin, this is one of my favorites, I think you have caught an amazing amount of personality in this dancer. I think you are too modest when it comes to your demo experience, because what Denise failed to also mention - besides the Q&A - is the entertainment value of the artist!

Bravo!

Beth, I'm more fun than a barrel of monkeys! I thought that was a given. And I clean up more easily. My main goal in every painting is to capture the light on and the life in my sitter, so I'm glad you connected with her. I learned so much doing this painting. Painting from life is the key to heaven.

Thank you Sharon. I really wish you could see this one in person. I painted on this one for six days. After the first few days my students kept saying, "How much farther can you take it?" I think it really set the bar, which was my intention to begin with.

Color Spaces
 

When every digital image file is viewed, there's a color space that your software package (Photoshop, PaintShop Pro, etc.) uses to display the information in a file as colors. There's a second color space that defines how the information in the digital file will be translated to any particular ink/paper combination for printing. So how an image is displayed in software is not how it will print.

How your image is displayed will depend on what you have your color space set to in your Nikon (some other digital cameras have color space settings also). The RGB color space setting attaches a color space profile (.icc file) to the digital image file, which will be read and applied in Photoshop and Nikon Capture, but very possibly not Nikon View. I haven't tried either of the Nikon software packages, but Nikon View may just be a simple application, and not set up for dealing with the complexity of color spaces. Or, if you're using a different color space setting on the camera, which doesn't attach a profile, try changing the default working space in Photoshop. I don't have the full Photoshop, only Elements, which only has three choices for color space in the Edit menu under Color Settings. I'm sure there's a similar setting in Nikon Capture.

For printing, either you can use the settings in your print driver, i.e. choosing the type of paper, etc. This will use the color space defined by the manufacturer for your particular printer/ink/paper, and is how the majority of people print, as it usually produces adequate results. Or, if you have had your printer/paper combination calibrated with a hardware/software package, in Photoshop Elements you can use color management in the Print Preview dialogue and attach the color space (.icc file) that the calibration produced. I'm sure it's similar for the full version of Photoshop. If you're getting excellent printed results, I would guess that you're using a specific calibrated icc profile for your printer/paper, unless perhaps you're lucky enough that the default color space defined by the manufacturer for your printer driver is excellent. A side note: if you're attaching a color space profile for printing in Photoshop, you have to turn off the color adjustment settings in your printer driver (exactly how depends on the driver) so that you're not double-profiling. Double-profiling, essentially telling the printer to use two different color spaces, can produce pretty funky results!

Anyway, that may be more than you wanted to know, and maybe this isn't appropriate to post this in your thread, but I hope it's helpful.

Holly

Values
 

Thank you Marvin, this is exactly what I was curious about. I should have clarified, when I said "Somehow you have made her seem so lifelike and 3 dimensional, but the value range within her face doesn't seem so large . . . at least not when compared to the dark value of her hair.", I was referring specifically to the skin tones, and not the nostrils or pupils.

Her cheek didn't look so dark to me (3 1/2), that's why I was asking. So I think you have proved to me that that wide range of values in skin tones is necessary to successfully show form.

thanks again,

Joan

Holly, thanks for taking the time to type out all this info.I started the thread so you have my permission to respond in any way you like. (Not that what I say counts for much!) I am aware of all the above info you posted. I've been into color management for years and yes I'm using icc profiles in my printer. The yellow problem in Photoshop started when I installed Photoshop CS and switched to Mac OS X. I actually called Nikon asking them what the problem was. They said that both Nikon software programs should look the same.Maybe I'll call back when I get a chance. I've checked all my color management settings In Nikon and Photoshop applications but alas, YELLOW!!!!!

Joan, it's not the range of values in any one area but the painting's overall arrangement that creates the illusion of form.

Range of values
 

Marvin,

I'm sorry but I don't understand what you mean :bewildere Do you mean it's the overall range of values in the entire painting that's important?

But . . . . to make a circle look like a ball, isn't it the range of values that makes it look like a ball? Even if it's a small range, that range is necessary, right? Or is that what you're saying, only a small range is necessary and I shouldn't get hung up on a large range of values?

Sorry to be harping on this value thing, but I'm feeling dense right now since I thought I understood what made a form 3d.

Joan

If you gave everything the fullest range of values possible you would create visual confusion. This is called over-modeling. If you over-model each area you lose the big relationships. The proper relationship between light and shadow areas would be destroyed if you expanded the value range of each. They would overlap value-wise and lose their separation and actually flatten out. The relationship between light and shadow is what creates form. The modeling enhances this effect but is at best secondary. Throw a thin halftone transition between the two main values, add a highlight, reflected light, accents and voila! Form!

Thanks Marvin
 

Marvin,

I do understand that much. I guess I thought there was something different you were talking about and I didn't know what that was. Sorry to have to ask you to explain all that when I did understand that, I guess somehow I just got confused with wording somewhere.

thanks,

Joan

Ok. It's too bad there's not an easy way of comparing the same images from our cameras side-by-side, as Garth mentioned in the Got the Blues thread.

Holly

I have copied Holly's post on Color Space here: http://forum.portraitartist.com/show...8781#post38781 so that the topic can be more easily located for those who are interested in color profiles.

Please go to the new thread to adress color space topics. Thanks.

Hi Marvin,

I just spotted this thread and your painting is Marvelous. Congratulations! I'm going to go back and take another long look at it.