First Time Portrait

Shinebox

Hey everyone, I've lurked long enough (1 year +) to be nervous about making my first post but I've read the rules and I thought I'd give it a shot so here we go.

I just finished my first real attempt at a digital painting and my first real attempt at a portrait and I'm kind of stuck as to where I can improve this.

The reference I used is a picture of a friend of mine at Halloween.



Here's the reference:



I'm just looking for any crits to improve it, open to all suggestions.

Thanks for looking.

bombardier

The colour is pretty good, most problems I see lie in the proportions and the fact that you've used a pretty terrible reference photo in that front on flash photos are the worst option to draw from. If you're choosing a photo to draw from, find something with a nice lightsource that isn't a built in camera flash. Drawing from life would be optimal, but using a flat photo with flattening light sources is a last resort thing.

As for the proportions, if you use the eyes as a reference point, you can see that the head is too wide and tall at the top. The eyes are going to be roughly in the middle of the skull from chin to the top of the skull. You've also got the hair going a lot further passed the ear prop and that's just compounding the giant head issue.

I'd suggest looking up some basic proportion diagrams for the head (such as the Loomis books in the Q&A thread) and get familiar with those basic guidelines.

NibCrom

I would suggest using a background. Doesn't need to be black like in the photo, but I don't think the white suit against a white background works well. As Bombsy said, the head is too big. It makes her look like a really young kid. Looks like you've been practicing. Keep up the good work!

Shinebox

Great so far, exactly what I was looking for.

Thanks guys

NakedZergling

the eyes are either too small or there is too much forehead, thus giving your head round balloon like shape. The nose is also a bit too short. the colors are looking solid.

Shinebox

Spent some time trying to fix the problems you guys pointed out - except for the background as I'm really not sure what I'd put there. I'll just leave it white for now until I get the head/face figured out.
Haha man it's so hard going back and erasing stuff I spent so much time on, moving stuff around n'such. Never really tried doing anything like this before.

Loomdun

You gave the lips to much curve she feels more like the Joker then a random crazy girl in a bunny outfit why so serious crazy bunny girl. why

JohnTWM

yeah but the face is much closer to the original now, except for the mouth it looks pretty good. The forehead isn't quite long enough now either I think... She seems to have maybe 1/2 and inch more forehead than you have given her here. I actually thought the original looked good until I saw the reference photo and realized it was a picture of someone older than I would have guessed... its like the first one is a 6 year younger version of the actual photo lol.

winter_combat_knight

The second paintover is much better. Only problem is her face looks a little too wide in your painting, i think it should be a little narrower from halfway down the face. Other than that it looks pretty good.

Just a question, did you mix the colours yourself, or select them from the photo? Just wondering because mixing in photoshop is bloody hard!

Shinebox

winter_combat_knight wrote: »

Just a question, did you mix the colours yourself, or select them from the photo? Just wondering because mixing in photoshop is bloody hard!

I'm not in Photoshop but instead Alias Sketchbook, but yeah - it is bloody hard.
Lots of trial and error for me but I mixed them myself - once I got going it got a bit easier.

Thanks for the crits guys, I'll try to fix it up a bit and then probably move on to another one - but if you've got any more crits keep them coming, please.

leaf

Loomdun wrote: »

You gave the lips to much curve she feels more like the Joker then a random crazy girl in a bunny outfit why so serious crazy bunny girl. why

she hates her father you see

Shinebox

Might be hard to tell without them side-by-side but I tried extending the forehead just a little bit, fixing the lips so they're less batman-villain-esque, slimming out the bottom half a bit (had a really hard time with this though), and a few other small things.

Tell me if you see anything that I've messed up in the process or if the improvements are anything but.



Keep the crits coming, they're incredibly useful for me - I never would have noticed this stuff.

Again, many thanks.

winter_combat_knight

I think you've done a good job with this. Good to see peoples advice has helped you. Maybe call this one finished and apply what you've learnt to a new painting. Well done.

JohnTWM

yeah It looks pretty good, not sure about the white background... but I mean w/e the face came out pretty well... the little stars at the corner of the eyes bothers me a bit though.. not quite sure why, don't look like they quite follow the contour of the face.

Loomdun

Silly photoshop and the power of the smudge tool

Mustang

Well in all fairness, it's so bloody irresistable sometimes.......it's like I don't want to, I know it's bad but maybe just a little smudging, I'm sure no-one will notice.

Shinebox

Loomdun wrote: »

Silly photoshop and the power of the smudge tool

Although I can certainly see where you're coming from here, for the record I didn't do this in Photoshop nor did I use any smudge tool in any program whatsoever.
What you're probably mistaking for the smudge tool are the brushes I used - I'm really new to this and I just kinda hopped in there without really much consideration of how the brushes would look. Instead I just kinda tried to get the colours to look right and get the shapes and such looking right (which from my first post you can see I failed horribly at haha)

Thanks for the crit(?) anyways.

Mustang

The soft brush tool can be mistaken for the smudge tool sometimes, for the record though I think you did a cracking job for a first off portrait and have a great attitude towards your work.

no_toast

I think in your next piece you should try some brushes with sharper edges when you make details such as the paint spots in this piece otherwise you'll always end up with something that looks like a blurred version of the reference you've used.

Shinebox

Yeah that's true, there are a few things I'd like to sharpen up next time.
I'll have to look for some tutorials on brush making later today - but if anyone has any guides that are good and can't be found on the first page of a google search then I'd be happy to be pointed in the right direction.
(Remember I don't have Photoshop).