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Hi Mike,
In a new book out about Philip de Laszlo entitled "A Brush with Grandeur", they showed several of his early works, including a self-portrait. I don't have the book anymore, but in my opinion his first works were more modeled and tighter, with shorter, blended strokes. They didn't have the beautiful loose, confident brushwork of his later portraits. Also the coloring of his early self-portrait was bland compared to the rich color of his later work. So I do think he (as one example of a master painter) evolved into his looser style after learning the human form in color and what works in a painting and what doesn't.
I also agree that it's much easier to know your palette. I'm still largely experimenting with different colors, however. Something David Leffel said in one of his videos really hit home for me recently. He said that (paraphased) it didn't matter if you match the exact color on a photo or model. You may not be able to get that exact color from your palette. Just use the colors on your palette to depict the topography of the subject, (values and edges) and it will always look like the person.
Jim,
Thank you for pointing the background and hair treatment out. I also think that when one learns the craft and critical elements, they can be confident and fast in their paintings. Again with Philip de Laszlo (sorry I'm not too versed on other artists), they said he was much more prolific than Sargent, and painted something like 3000 portraits in his lifetime!
Cheers,
Holly
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