Jo's Portrait

4th Lesson - Marylyn Maro

When painting a portrait, I like to begin with the eyes.  After painting in the whites with a slightly purple hue, I colour in the iris (in my case, a hazel colour) then the dark pupil, using a mix of Ultramarine Blue and Scarlet.  To set the eye into the socket, you need to deal with it in the same way as a ball - shadow around the edges of the white and up under the eyelid.  A lighter hazel colour can then be added onto the iris for highlights leaving a darker ring around the edge.  At this stage, I don't worry about eyelashes until after I have some flesh tones painted in.

For flesh tones, I am using a Scarlet, Cadmium Lemon and Pthalo Green with Ultramarine Blue added for any shadows.  Mix the Scarlet and Lemon first, slowly adding the Green, which is a very strong colour.  This is my base colour - by adding white, I have a highlight.  With the same base colour you can add the Ultramarine Blue and extra Scarlet for a rich shadow colour.  Once these three colours are mixed on the palette, I can work quickly over the whole face, using the base colour, highlights and shadows where needed.  Then I can go back into the face and start on detail.

7th Lesson - Greek Steps

Thought we'd try and sort out what to do with the blank white wall.  I decided to fill it with bougainvillea.  I painted in the branches first, to get an idea of where I wanted the flowers.  The flowers were then dabbed in straight from the tube of Scarlet.  I then darkened the Scarlet with some Ultramarine Blue and dabbed that into the right side of the flowers for shadow.  I highlighted the left side of them with a little bit of Scarlet and white mix.  I wanted them to sit into the wall better, so I mixed a soft purple colour and dabbed around the edges of the flowers with this, mainly on the right-hand side.