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Janet,
I know this is just adding to the pile.
I find this happens to my work when I have been working too exclusively from photographs. There is a tendency to get TOO CLOSE and see each feature individually.
Another problem is that we see each photograph as an opportunity to make a finished product instead of a work of art.
There are times we have to step back to square one and relearn the stuff they all too infrequently did not teach us even in the finest of art schools; mainly how to make form.
I would get the book, "The Practice and Science of Drawing", by Harold Speed, available on this web-site. It goes back to the basics, especially working in black and white before attempting form.
There is another thread on the Bargue method on this site. That is working again sight-size in monochrome from classcal forms.
These are invaluable tools in the foundation of really fine figurative work.
If you are serious about becoming a portrait artist, endlessly reproducing photographs is not the way to go. The competition is stiff and numerous. The best gift you can give yourself is a good foundation.
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