Dan

[Sharon Knettell]

Chuck,

I see by your bio that you want to take portraiture seriously. If that is so, you have to do all the serious study a field like this entails.

You obviously are an educated and intelligent man, not afraid of hard and dedicated work.

I would suggest you review the suggestions I made in the thread "Critiques and Anger; a Lethal Mix".

Roberta Carter Clark has an excellent book called "How to Paint Living Portraits". I would suggest you do that from A to Z. Do not use color until you have mastered form. Then get Daniel Greene's drawing tape, next his painting tape.

I would prefer to see your next post be a study of a head from life, not just another rendering of a photo.

Sincerely,

[Chuck Yokota]

Hi Sharon,

Thanks for your comments and suggestions. I am serious about improving, and will do whatever work I need to to accomplish this. I will look into all your suggestions.

I do not have a painting from life; I am attaching a drawing I recently did from life. I can see the same issues that were brought up about my painting in the Oil Critiques section: I handicapped myself from the start with frontal and non-directional lighting, and did not use the cues remaining to render the full three-dimensional form of the overall head. This in turn contributed to drawing problems: the hair looks flat, the forehead is too flat, she looks cross-eyed, and the edge of her face on our right comes out too far.

[Chuck Yokota]

I am just realizing how much my unconscious idea of what constitutes "normal" lighting has been influenced by the years I've spent in rooms lit by arrays of ceiling-mounted fluorescent fixtures. I had come to take this as my default lighting when rendering drawings, even despite the actual lighting conditions. I wonder if future generations will wonder why old paintings always showed people in dark closets.

[Sharon Knettell]

Chuck,

That is an very nice initial drawing. Consider it your first tiny step.

You have much to learn before you can hang out your shingle. I would not even consider doing commissions right now. That would be really jumping the gun. Give yourself several serious years or more of intensive study before you handicap yourself.

I see much too much dreadfull commissioned work done before the artists are ready. I have done that also and I wish I could burn those canvases.

Being an accommplished artist is not a race. Approach this a not wanting to be a portrait artist, but wanting to be the best artist you can be.

You did not get your first position based on your experience with a toy chemistry set from Toys 'R Us.

Sincerely,

[Chuck Yokota]

Hi Sharon,

Thank you for your advice. I will have to consider it carefully; I would be a fool to simply ignore the advice of an artist as successful and experienced as you, as hard as it may be for me to hear it. It is a little late to not begin, but I will have to think about what retrenching or stopping would mean at this point. I suppose putting "the cart before the horse," as you put it in an earlier post, comes naturally to me; I worked successfully as an engineer for fifteen years before I ever took an engineering class.

[Sharon Knettell]

Chuck,

Ironically, so did my brother-inlaw. It is never too late to pursue something you love even if it is only part time. Life should not be wasted on regrets or what ifs.

Look 5 years down the line and see what you would like to be doing. Portrait art is a very competitve business, and takes 5 to 10 years after you have mastered your craft to get somewhat established.

I am now doing my own work which I will post soon.

Good luck on whatever direction you decide to take.

Sincerely,