My first submission
 

Hi,

With all my heart I hope to be painting full time next year. and to that end, any critiques and observations are much appreciated - thanks!

34 x 44" high
Oil on Linen
From Photo taken by me for the painting

OOPs!
 

oops - here's the image!

This is a striking portrait, Linda.

My first impression is the quiet drama of this young woman. You

Thanks
 

Thanks so much for the comments. I think I could have done better with the background, too. One driving thing is that the father (for whom this is a present) is a home builder, and the architecture of the home is supposed to be like a second personality in the painting, as it's significant to them. But it also breaks the mood.

I'll post the reference photos as you suggest.

Thanks again!

Linda

The pose is very nice and you have handled the paint well, but I feel you are being hindered by your reference more than your painting ability.

The thing that strikes me right off is the photographic distortion in the perspective. I may be completely wrong, but I bet you held your camera at eye level (about the same or slightly above the eye level of the subject) when you took the photo. And I would also bet that the lens was 50mm or less. This is exactly the type of thing I refer to when I talk about some of the problems you can encounter when painting from photos.

Now don't get me wrong, I think there are many good things in this painting, but I feel unless you address this distortion, even if you rendered everything else with complete perfection as you see it in the photo, the painting would still seem off somehow. Others may disagree with me and that is fine. I just see snapshot here, not a portrait that is equal to your painting ability.

Thanks
 

You're absolutely right about the distortion, and it's been bothering me as well since I've finished it. I should have used a longer lens so her front hand and the chair aren't so large as compared to the face and lamp.

Ironically, my father is a a professional photographer, yet I always get too caught up in the moment of all the things to think about and then mess up on an obvious basic like this. Do you think it works, assuming I would have shot this as it is, then caught it once at home, to manipulate the file so as to compensate for the distortion? I use a Canon E10 Digital camera with a zoom lens.

What is the issue that you bring up with the eye level?

Thanks for your critique. It's a compliment that you've taken the time.

P.S. It is sure many masters used camera obscuras, etc. How do you think they contended with the same problem as lens distortion?

Linda

Dear Linda,

Welcome to the Forum! You have said you plan to be a full time painter over the next year, so I hope you don't mind my taking you at your word, because that's going to come up more quickly than you can imagine! So please forgive me for cutting right to the chase here. You have excellent drawing skills and control over your paint already, so I wanted to make some observations about your process and early decisions.

Composition and value massing are the key elements that I think you should consider in future work. (To illustrate this point I've attached a rough sort of diagram.)

In this painting, you have major compositional challenges going on, primarily, I think, because there is no clear value scheme going on. If you squint at the painting, you'll see that there are a lot of small islands of dark - little eye-traps that fail to support, and actually work against your center of interest, which I am sure is meant to be this young woman's face. Notwithstanding the very observant points Michael has raised about photographic distortion, the network of bannisters reads as an almost hieroglyphic-type pattern that is isolated from the rest of the painting, and constitutes a bunch of arrows that actually lead the eye away from the focal point.

The darkest dark, (which in the overall value scheme you have going) is the swirled wooden pattern in the chair, which works as strongly as the bannister to remove the viewer from your center of interest.

The somewhat lesser dark that forms an outlined island around the lampshade acts as an eye-trap, noticeable, but visually there's nowhere to go after coming to rest upon it. There is another smaller island created by the (I assume) left edge of the round coffee table upon which the lamp sits.

There are other eye-traps that occur as a result of the negative spaces in the painting, which I would guess happened without intent. In the lower left of the picture, the swirl in the chair's wooden armrest comes close enough to the edge of the canvas to cause the eye to focus there, and to act as a tangent. I see a long vertical line along the left edge, which may be some artifact of the photo of the painting, or it may be part of the architecture. If the latter, you would want to get rid of it.

How do you deal with these things and avoid them in the next painting? Here are some thoughts:

You were hired to paint this painting because your client believes you know better than he does. Don't disappoint him. If the notion of including the identity of architecture, as represented by the staircase, diminishes the painting, either find a way to integrate it so completely within your composition that it supports the painting as a whole, or tell him it can't be a part of the painting. Have him build a beautiful presentation case instead.

Review all the information on this Forum with regard to photographing your subject; there's a wealth of stuff here. Use the "search messages" function at the top of the page.

Plan your value scheme in advance. Try using a thumbnail sketch, forcing all your shapes into just three values. Connect your dominant values, as well as your subordinate values. Sprinkle in interest in values later as necessary to move the eye toward the center of interest in a visually pleasing way. Review all the information on this Forum regarding values, value massing, or composition.

Control your edges to help support your center of interest. Again, use the "search message" button.

I hope you will view this critique with the most sincere way in which it is meant. You are already ahead of the game with your skill in drawing, sense of color harmony, and control of the paint. As of now, you only have 11 months and 29 days, so no time to *****foot around.

Kindest regards,
Chris

Thank you very much
 

Chris,

A very sincere thanks for the critique, and I agree that the composition is clumsy, detracting from the face and elegance of the feminine lines of the body.

Besides, of course, recomposing the work completely, I personally think one way to "save" the painting as it is would be to modify the background colors to a much darker field, to add a SUBTLE pattern to the wall so that all of the information surrounding the subject here is closer in value (therefore eliminating islands of pattern and value), and also helping contrast and emphasize the lighter value of the face, to bring back to the main focus.

Thanks again,
Linda

Laying with the background
 

Just thought I'd quickly illustrate what I mean to see if you thing it's a solution Chris...

Linda,

Big improvement. It's unclear whether you plan to actually make any changes in the painting or whether you are looking for solutions that might apply to future work.

If you plan to actually change the painting, you'll need to be religiously careful about the stripes. They must be straight, exactly sized, and their perspective has to be accurate.

There's much more visual support for the figure, but without getting rid of the bannisters and lamp, you are probably at the limit of where you can go compositionally.