Babysitter portrait

[Sharon Knettell]

Some final tips; overrouge her cheeks, an eighteenth centurty portrait trick. It may look strong for street or even evening wear, but it works well for portraiture. Also find a makeup base that will cover her reddish nose. Adding deodorant to a makeup base will keep a face from glowing too much on a hot day.

Get the look you need. I have even called in makeup artists and hairdressers when needed. The clients have always picked up the tab.

Ah, what artist's can do. It is like plastic surgery, only the result, ie. the painting lasts longer.

Paint as many heads from life so you can loosen up your brushstokes and give your work individuality. I recently found a portrait site and I would not have been able to tell if the portraits had been done by different people if the vignettes had not been labeled. The style, design and concepts were all alike. A good deal of the portrait artists were well known also.

[Joan Breckwoldt]

This is my favorite of the new batch of photos I took this morning of my model. And I NEVER could have come up with this without all the help I got on the forum and specifically this thread!

I went shopping over the weekend and bought a dress for the model. Sharon, I never would have thought to do this without your suggestion. I found this dress at a resale shop and knew it would be perfect on my model.

My model showed up with her mother this morning. I was a little anxious, not nervous, just anxious, to have the mother watching everything I did. But it turned out well because the mom was impressed with my set-up and she amost fell over backwards when she learned I bought a dress just for her daughter to wear for this portrait.

Here is my favorite:

Joan

[Joan Breckwoldt]

Here are some others that I liked from the photo shoot this morning. I tried a different pose in the white dress but it just doesn't compare to that gray dress, in my mind. Sorry to post so many but I tried lots of different poses and I wanted to share.

Joan

[Allan Rahbek]

Hi Joan,

Here is my opinion.

I also like the standing one, because of the fine dress and the colors of the light on it.

But I think that the hair on her left shoulder makes her look like she is hiding herself, it should be back. Her hands form a too closed figure, maybe try with other positions of the hands. And her upper body should be seen more frontal like in the one with the chair ( my other favorite )

Finally I think that the yellow light on her face should be less hard.

Allan

Ps. Would it be possible to do something with the dress to make her bosom look more natural? I am a foreigner, so maybe this request should have had another form ? Please remove it if i said something wrong.

[Jean Kelly]

Hi Joan,

I have a very simple photo program called "Pixelenance" that I use to modify some of my photos. I removed some yellow and red in your photos, I hope you don't mind. The second one I also took out some of the blue reflection also. They look much more natural now, what do you think? If you don't have a way to manipulate your photos and would like me to enhance them, send me a high res image and I'll try it out.

I like the grey dress, and the poses are very nice, good job. The extra work is well worth it. I took me two years to get it, you are on your way now.

Jean

[Joan Breckwoldt]

Hi Allan

Thank you for your suggestions. I see what you mean about the chest and I think it's the dress, not her. I'll fix that shape when I paint it.

I had taken some photos from a more frontal point of view but the model and her mother seem to prefer the more 'sideways' shots. I think it makes her look more slender and elongated. Thank you for your observations, it's always good to hear different points of view. It helps me to understand how important it is to shoot many, many poses.

Joan

[Joan Breckwoldt]

Hi Jean,

Wow, what an improvement! I love what you did with your program to the colors. I think it's about time I join the 21st Century and buy some kind of program where I can manipulate my photos. I plan to buy photoshop as soon as I can get a minute to get over to the computer store. (Then I'll have to learn how to use it . . .).

But thank you so much (!!!!!!) for offering to enhance the photos for me. If I can't get it figured out I will take you up on that offer. I'm not familiar with "Pixelenance".

The extra work was worth it. And I haven't even started painting yet!

Thanks again for your comments and the changes you made,

Joan

[Jean Kelly]

I think "Pixelenhance" is a Mac program, I downloaded it free from the internet. Free is always good. I have "Photoshop Elements" but still haven't learned how to use it, I need "Photoshop for Dummies"!

Jean