Portrait of my father as a young lad

Jennifer Geary · 04-10-2002, 01:01 PM

Hello all!

I decided to go about drawing portraits of my family members, in order to hone my drawing skills a bit before jumping back into portrait painting. This is a drawing of my father during his college years and he is so handsome!

I used ebony pencils for it on illustration board. Okay, Steven, have at it! I am anxious to hear what you and others have to say about it. I know it isn't perfect, and I have been staring at it for 2 days now, so please take a moment and comment away! Thanks for all your time! You guys are awesome!

Steven Sweeney · 04-10-2002, 07:23 PM

Jennifer,

Yes, he's a handsome fellow, his likeness I'm sure well-captured in your drawing. As for the execution of the drawing, the first thing that catches my eye is the treatment of shadow areas under the chin and jawline on our right, and on the neck. The shadow under the chin seems to come up too high and too dark in value, so that it skews the chin over to our left. As a shadow approaches the light, it will become progressively lighter as well. The shadows on the neck seem a bit dark to me, especially on what appears to be the lighted side of the figure. This is exacerbated a bit by those deep, dark accent lines underneath the chin and the jawline. I would ease up on those quite a bit -- even if there's a strong chin and jawline, it wouldn't in nature be as bold or as sharp as a "line".

I guess I'd expect the ear on the shadow side to be a little darker over all. Many of the surfaces within that structure will be very near to parallel to the planes of the face that are in shadow, right up to the ear.

In describing a value area with a series of lines, experiment with letting the lines run "around" the form, so as to describe that form, rather than using crosshatching or lines moving in a variety of direction. The area I'm looking at is on the forward part of the shadow side of the cheek. Also, keep a good, sharp point on your pencil or charcoal, which necessarily requires working relatively slowly and patiently to build up a value or transition area, but you will have greater control and avoid thick dark lines within those areas.

Lastly, I'm digging up this quote, which got buried in another thread, but which I think beautifully describes the pleasures of this kind of work.

Anthony Ryder writes in "The Artist's Complete Guide to Figure Drawing" (Watson-Guptill 2000):

"The patient elaboration of value with a very sharp pencil induces a mental state in which you feel as if you are actually sculpting the surface of the body within the virtual reality of the drawing. With practice, you can develop an acute sensitivity to subtle variations in the surface of the form, as if there were nerve endings at the point of your pencil."

Cheers,
Steven

Jennifer Geary · 04-11-2002, 01:24 PM

Ah, thank you for your wisdom, Steven, it is MUCH appreciated! I have cut and pasted your reply into my LEAST favorite program, Microsoft Word, and printed it out for reference as I work on this portrait. I agree with everything you stated, and thanks for helping me along with this, you are a wonderful teacher! When I make the corrections, I will post the finished piece for you to check out. (this is so much fun!) It's nice to have friends like you! :-)

Peggy Baumgaertner · 04-11-2002, 04:55 PM

Jennifer,

I see three drawing errors. The nose is too far to the (our) right, the mouth is marginally also too far to the (our) right, and the jaw (on our right) is too carved in and shallow. It should follow the same sweeping arc that matches the jaw on the (our) left side. The chin is not wide enough at the bottom on (our) right side. It should also follow the shape of the chin on the (our) left side. Think symmetry when putting a face together.

The rest of the drawing is very well done.

Peggy