Tony Ryder portrait painting workshop

[Michele Rushworth]

... and, what I always like to see, a very close closeup shot.

[Michele Rushworth]

SOG Forum member Carl Toboika emailed me some questions about this workshop and I thought the exchange of information might be of interest to others:

Carl: Thank you for your very thorough Tony Ryder workshop thread. You did a wonderful job, the photos were great, and I like working on a wash in
myself.

Your wash in and drawing looked cool, but I didn't see the horizontal and vertical lines that I saw in Bill Whitaker's workshop from you. I assume they were in charcoal and then discarded. How did you like that method of beginning? Is the wash-in the only stage you had time to complete? I didn't see a picture of your form painting.

I have a couple of questions for you. I see when he goes over the wash-in, he gets the soft edges and subtle transitions amazingly well, in what
seems like one layer over the wash in. What is his method for blending, or getting these soft edges and subtleties?

Does he use relatively fluid paint over the wash in, or keep it thicker?

Also how does he neutralize his colors?



Michele: I did draw the model using horizontal and vertical lines (to mark important measurements) like I used in Bill's workshop, in charcoal, and I erased them once I had the overall shape done.

I finished the form painting and I should post it. I'm not 100% happy with my drawing, etc., so even though I really like the skin textures I
was able to produce, I don't think the overall piece was one of my best. Perhaps over the next couple of days I'll post what I did in the form
painting, anyway, since there are things that might be useful to see.

In future I may greatly simplify the wash-in stage, with just large masses of thinned general colors, so I can still see the drawing. I find that step very time consuming and I

[Michele Rushworth]

Here's my form painting. It has a totally different feel than Tony's, partly because the model I was working from had a much more rugged skin texture.

I'm not totally happy with my drawing, especially with the eyes and the direction of their gaze, but this is as far as I got.

[Michele Rushworth]

There's a lot of glare on the shadow areas to the right so you can't really see what's going on there, unfortunately.

I don't think the photo shows it, but in person this painting has a much more realistic skin texture than anything I've painted before.

[Elizabeth Schott]

Michele, I have really enjoyed watching this progress. And I must say your personal work has grown it leaps and bounds! Bravo!

When you were highlighting the chin that was Tony's demo, and explaining it to Carl, I am afraid I was having a senior moment. Are you saying he almost stipples the color onto the canvas then blends with a sable? I found when I had problems with a hand, I could do a posterized value output and stipple the mapped value and it really helped to simplify and kept the skin texture from needing dermabrasion. What size brush (European/American) is he using for this process?

I have found most people do the underpainting from life pretty much the same way, like we did with Bill. I find this the best method for me if I am working from reference, but the one Marvin teaches, is really different and just really works well when drawing from life. Your start by toning your whole canvas to the darkest tone of the skin and wipe off or add depending on value needed, it gives you a 6 hour window.

Knowing you have all the time in the world could you possibly post just a small sample of the actual application of color with the small brush!

Great job! You are lucky! I wish now I had paid better attention to your easel position, I hope you got a good one this time!

Beth

[Michele Rushworth]

Below is a link to one of the demo stills on Tony's website. He uses a brush that is no more than one eighth of an inch wide by a quarter of an inch long, probably smaller. Since brush sizes vary so much by manufactuer I'll tell you that it would be equivalent to using a Trekell brand Golden Taklon nylon watercolor brush in size 1.

He doesn't really stipple then blend. He paints the whole thing with this size brush.

In this shot he is shown doing the chin. First he does the darks in a particular area, and then gradually surrounds the light areas until he has built up the whole rounded form or sub-form, working from dark to light:

http://www.tonyryder.com/demo/opaque/pages/P7300083.htm

If you go to his site and go through all the demo shots (the poster study, the wash-in and the form painting, either one at a time or watch the slide show) you get a pretty good idea of his method.

http://www.tonyryder.com

[Elizabeth Schott]

Thanks Michele, I had been to his site often last year but do not remember those demos. It is amazing how much he transforms his figures in the "form" stage.

This may sound like an incredibly silly question, but did you ever ask him what brand of vine charcoal he uses? It seems so stiff not like the stuff I find. I have an incredibly hard time drawing with it because of this. It seems his is hard enough to hold a point longer than two marks.

Thanks, Beth

[Michele Rushworth]

He recommended Grumbacher vine charcoal. Perhaps some of the issue has to do with the texture of the surface he works on. He uses quite smooth canvas, and I used it on my smooth Claessens 13 dp linen and it worked fine. We were often sharpening the charoal sticks though.

[Carl Toboika]

Wow, you completed a lot! Workshops are often limited in what you can finish because of the time factors. This came out very nice Michele!