Sheeba

[Lisa Ober]

Kim, I immediately thought of you when I started to change it! I remember thinking I would never go to the trouble of changing a background when I saw your last thread but lo and behold, that was a famous last thought.

Claudemir, thanks. I'm relieved. It's certainly more subtle.

Patricia, wow, I appreciate that! I was very happy with the skin tones so hearing that makes me feel good. By all means, drop on by. I would love to meet you. Should I put the coffee on now?

You know, this one is my first experiment with glazing/scumbling (I'm still working on the true definitions of each). Except for the little bit more drying time it didn't take that long. I did an underpainting which I never have done, followed by a few layers for color. The underpainting made adding color insanely easy. I probably have a good full day of work into it but it came in stages over a few days. I LOVED this method. It really fits my natural tendencies to pick away at details, etc.

I'm not sure I am soaring but my great prayer is that I continually improve even if it's like taking one step backward and then two steps forward. I want my growth chart to look like a good year for the stock market.

Chris, great question! That was at the top of my list. I worried more about that than anything else since I didn't want to rework the face. I had a decent likeness and feared losing it. Reworking it too much made me nervous. This one was an excellent mini-lesson in color theory. I had to think about what I was going to put on there. I don't know how well it shows, but the background has a lot of (albeit toned down) warm orange-ish/reddish color in it even though it reads as a pale green in general. Putting that in prevented me from causing Sheeba to turn orange. It was shocking to see the results. I put the two photos together and was stunned at how different the backgrounds affected the skin. I was amazed to see that her overall skin tone continued to read the same way. I really think the orange addition (though subtle) did the trick. I had trouble photographing the first version as the background kept throwing it off but the second version is quite accurate. I think the skin tones look pretty natural in spite of the change. I never would have guessed it. I was sure I was going to have to entirely re-work the face but as it turned out I didn't. Great question.