Step 4

I am finally back to painting after a few days break. I wasn't lazy though, I was watching hours of instructional videos on how to paint with oils. I felt I wasn't getting the idea just trying it on my own. A big problem was glare on the painting while working and the videos helped me identify what the problem was. A light source (a window in my case) directly behind me made the glare. I've rearranged my studio so the light is coming from the side and no more problems with glare.

I wanted to start covering large areas of the canvas next with a middle value before I went back to the face. There are no details yet or shading but the canvas is covered. I can see now the grey background needs to be lightened as well. The yellow lines in the vest are where fold lines are and I didn't want to lose the lines by painting over them. Here is today's efforts. The whitish area on the right background is glare and not there in real life.

Step 3

I am still struggling with switching to another medium. I know how to make watercolours do what I want but oil paints are so thick and dry compared to them. Also, I find the pigments are not the same (at least I'm not familiar enough with them yet). So today I worked some more on the eye and started blocking in some of the darkest colours on the face. Whoever said that oils dry slowly so you have lots of time to blend wasn't using mine. Yesterday's work was almost dry to touch so it made it hard to put another layer on. I'm watching You Tube videos for tips on working in oils.

step 2

It almost doesn't feel like I did enough today to call it step 2. I am just learning a new medium, different brushes, and different technique so as I feel more comfortable I'll speed up my painting. Today I started blocking in some colour around one eye and adjusted colours in the whites and irises. Getting a photo of it is really difficult because the wet paint makes a glare. The glare also alters the colours a bit. The background is grey, not bluish purple. So many new things to learn.

Hidden Struggle step 1

This is the really ugly stage of the painting. LOL. I toned the whole painting first with a yellow ocher colour to give it a warm underpainting and lock in the pencil lines. Today I started painting the background and the first layers of colour in the eyes and mouth. The colours look a little strange because the yellow is still showing through the semi-transparent first washes on the eyes and mouth. There will be a gradual build up of colour as it progresses. The first thing I realized after getting back to oils after so long is that I need better brushes.

Starting my next painting

I'm working on the drawing for my next painting which will be in oils. It is a portrait of my brother-in-law and larger than life size (24 x 30"). Most of the drawing is done but I'm still correcting the eyes (they are not looking in the same direction). I'll try and finish the drawing tonight so I can start putting in some background tomorrow. This is drawn on gessoed hardboard.

This is for a show with our local art club scheduled for December (oils take a long time to dry). This isn't a very good photo but it's hard to get a decent photo of lines on a white background.