The Little Peeps
By Alan Waterhouse
It's Getting Exciting Now.
In this segment I will be finishing off work on Little Missy and get the Little Fella close to being done as possible. I love it when I get to this stage because I can see how well my composition will work on the canvas as a finished picture and it’s at this point where I have to decide what to do about the background.
Little Missy.
The first thing is to lighten her lips a little by adding some highlights which will also create depth.
For the beads on her necklace I used Cad Yellow deep and added a touch of of Cad Orange to create some darker shades plus some Titanium White for the ones in between.
“Before the decision to call a portrait painting finished I leave it out for a day or two so I can look at it from every angle and in differing light”.
I used two different blacks and a tint of white to create the range on her top then using the darkest black I defined the creases which also helps project the form giving it the feeling of 3d.
When I mixed the skin tones I put extra in to an air tight pot in case I needed to do any touch ups on the face and so when I added extra touches of skin colour to go on her forehead it was a perfect match.
All that was left was to add more hair remembering to follow the contour of her skull as this helps define the shape.
I will leave her portrait out for the next few days until I am sure it is perfect but for now I am delighted to see her.
The Little Fella.
The first thing I wanted to sort out was the shape of his mouth and in particular the cupids bow that was too narrow and his bottom lip wasn’t full enough.
Using the skin tones I had premixed I added some more layers to his face and blended them with a clean wet brush which lessened the heat in his cheeks.
His top is covered by some great shadows and creases that show the width and depth of his shoulders. He wears a beaded necklace similar to his sisters and Burnt Sienna plus Burnt Umber coloured it
The challenge was always going to be his wonderful long curly hair which has so many different colours according to which lighting conditions its exposed to.
All that remains for The Little Fella is to cover his hair with lots of blonde highlights but in the meantime I will leave his portrait out so I can examine it.
The truth is I love these two so having their portraits out will be like having them here anyway.
See you soon – Al
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