Oil painting

[Number 28]

Sadly just a good friend, but she's very quite gorgeous.

[Fry Crayola]

POST PIX PLZ!

[Number 28]

Noooo... I don't wanna hear everyone's grimy thoughts on here. You'll have to make do with my painting.

[Fry Crayola]

I was going for the irony of asking for pics in a thread that was based on the posting of a pic, but your way's good too.

[Number 28]

Well, photos of her are infinitely better than my painting. 8)

Shit, that sounded creepy didn't it.

[larrydavidsanger]

I only paint in oils, acrylics dry far too easily and are far too flat for my style. I like to slap it on thick and sort of sculpt it on the canvas. Like you, number 28, I'm a big fan of portraits, or at least a person or people being the main focus of my paintings. I get so bored painting landscapes and I never know when to stop in an abstract painting so I stick to people.

I've got an exhibition coming up in Sheffield in January if anyone in the area is interested, it's in the blocspace gallery from Jan 12th. I am shitting myself that I haven't done enough work for it though.

[Number 28]

I'd be very interested in seeing your stuff - you should post some on here if you haven't already. If you wanna put it in here I can turn this into 'the portrait thread'. Hopefully there'll be more interest.

[larrydavidsanger]

Here's some of the more recent stuff that I've got around to photographing...

Older ones

[Monkeyspill]

I always used to paint with acrylics because I tend to be very detail orientated, and oils are better suited to more relaxed methods I think. Regardless, I had a crack and I found them fantastic for getting more varied shades and hence more realistic results thanks to the ease at which you can mix the colours. It's when you come to the fine details they can be a bit of a nightmare if the paint hasn't dried. I just finished painting the picture below as a xmas present for a friend (girl on the right), and I was feeling the crunch when I wanted to apply detail and it wasn't drying... oils can take up to 6 months to dry properly.

So, does anyone else dabble in this sort of thing? I'm sure there was an impressive painter on here that did whole bodies. Share some tips if you will!

Wow! That's really great!!

I've got a load of old oil paints kicking around - I've never got round to doing anything with them though.

[Number 28]

Great stuff larrydavidsanger. I'm wondering how you layer up the paint like that without it all mixing together, or do you have to wait for it to dry first? Surely when you paint that thick with oils it must take 6 months to dry? I wouldn't have the patience.

That's Takeshi Kitano isn't it... is it Sonatine? I've not seen any of his films for years. Liking the movie death montage too. I can see Kill Bill, Scanners and Battle Royale...not sure about the others though. The one on the far right reminds me of Starship Troopers when the guy gets his brains sucked out, but I know it's not that. These sorta pictures are the kinda thing my teacher would always give me a bollocking for doing at school. Love it.

[larrydavidsanger]

It does all mix together, I'm always wrestling against a smudgey, dirty colour I just keep reapplying paint on top of paint which is part of the reason the paintings end up so thick. At the moment I'm working in the shed out the back of our house and it's bloody freezing in there so a painting can dry in around 2 days, sometimes less. I've never really experienced much longer drying times than maybe a month before unless it's the god awful water-based oils that I used over 2 years ago which still haven't dried fully!

It is indeed Kitano from Sonatine. That's part of my final exhibition for my degree and one of the paintings I'm proudest of The set of 9 from top left to right is; Deer Hunter, Scanners, Audition, Kill Bill, A Better Tomorrow 2, Battle Royale, Alien, Evil Dead 2, Akira

[Number 28]

I spotted some water-based oils when I was shopping last, and I was wondering about them. It sounds like they're tosh though eh? I can't say I mind using this sansodor stuff as a medium, but at the time I was using turps and I was quite tempted to rid myself of the turps smell. So what do you use to thin the paint and wash your brushes?

Edit: Oh yeah, thanks btw Clumpyjamie.

You should have a crack at sommit.

[larrydavidsanger]

They're perfectly fine, very good in fact if you don't want to get your clothes dirty as it just washes out... but they retain moisture somehow forever so that negates any positives for me and you. I use turps/white spirit for cleaning brushes along with this pale green liquid stuff I bought in the art shop which helps too. For medium, I don't really use it all that much, rather just chuck it all on the canvas straight away... I only thin down backgrounds and I just use "artist's medium," a treacle coloured liquid thing. I used to use liquin but it seemed to prolong the drying period.

[Number 28]

Well i'd certainly recommend sansodor if the whiff gets too much. I think it's basically refined turpentine that doesn't smell of anything. I guess it's not so problematic if you're working in a shed. I sleep in the same room as this stuff.

[larrydavidsanger]

Aye, that's why I moved. One spillages of sludgy turps too many. My floor looks like I've had a dirty protest

[Number 28]

Your carpet must smell pretty bad.

[Number 28]

Sneak preview of my next piece!

Again, excuse the awful quality. My shitty old webcam is all I have to play with. I had to borrow my sister's camera for the final piece.

All that's been done is the initial sketch, inking, then oil 'wash' over the top.

Here's what i'm going for -

I thought the huge variety of skin tones and the interesting lighting would make for a good challenge. We'll see how it goes...

[Asura]

I'm interested then; I'm just starting to get into Acrylics. Is it possible to get the same "fluid" blending of skintones etc in that medium? I know you can use layers and layers of glaze, but I get impatient waiting for each layer to dry .

[Number 28]

It's possible, it's just not as easy. With acrylics it's easy to blend from one colour to another - i'd always blend by gradually watering the colour down more and more and spreading it about as smoothly as possible. Blending many colours together at the same time would be trickier, although not impossible. It's been a while since I painted with acrylics.

[larrydavidsanger]

Sneak preview of my next piece!

Again, excuse the awful quality. My shitty old webcam is all I have to play with. I had to borrow my sister's camera for the final piece.

All that's been done is the initial sketch, inking, then oil 'wash' over the top.

Here's what i'm going for -

I thought the huge variety of skin tones and the interesting lighting would make for a good challenge. We'll see how it goes...

That's got a lot of potential, especially in your style. I don't think it would work quite so well if I did it... good luck!

[Tungtvann]

Hey, I'm impressed. Being so totally and utterly wank at art, I marvel at people who can do this stuff.

[Asura]

It's possible, it's just not as easy. With acrylics it's easy to blend from one colour to another - i'd always blend by gradually watering the colour down more and more and spreading it about as smoothly as possible. Blending many colours together at the same time would be trickier, although not impossible. It's been a while since I painted with acrylics.

Ok, just to check, what I'd been planning to do is (assuming I'm shading skin)

Mix up a base colour. This will be 2/3rds of the way between darkest and lightest tones, further towards the lightest.

Paint the basic shapes in this tone.

Add a little more paint and a tiny drop of black to make it deeper, and water it down to a glaze.

Apply first coat of glaze for shadows. Wait to dry.

Apply second coat, dry, third etc.

Darken slightly, then continue glazing.

Lastly, add a touch of a cold colour such as blue for the absolute darkest areas, and glaze once more.

Then, mix up a lighter version of the colour and do highlights, adding white, doing two or three glazes to get the whitemost bits. Finally adding a tiny bit of pure white glaze in some places.

Obviously waiting for drying within each glaze step.

This is my current impression of the workflow for creating subtle blending via the use of glazes. Sound ok?

[Asura]

Crap, just been on FARP and their tutorials state that you should use something called "medium" in order to produce a glaze.

Still, going to have a crack with water; I'm just painting a picture of my wooden artist's mannequin for my first bash at still life.

[Number 28]

They basically mean thin it down with water (or a solvent if you're using oils) and apply it so it's slightly transparent (a glaze).

[Number 28]

Bit of an update, just for laughs.

I've just been getting the skin tones sorted, after which i'll start adding the details. Takes a while to get the tones in because there are many different light sources. It makes for a more interesting painting though I think. My previous painting looks a bit flat and bland in comparison - that's using a flash for you.

Next i'll be working more on the hand, as i've barely begun it. It's something that'll need a lot of work to get right, but it should come good.

Have any of you lot got £300 burning a hole in your pocket? I need to buy a camera.

[Archie]

Good lord dude, that's looking good. Great source as well - that's the kind of photo I'd go for in drawing too. I'd be tempted to get rid of, move or thin that strand of hair that's covering her left eye but it looks like that might be what you're doing too.

I can empathise with the limited capture methods - it's a right pain in the arse.

[Number 28]

Cheers.

I quite like the strand over the eye though, because basically the eyes are solid darkness (not black ) so there's little interest going on in them. It's a bit of a shame because I liked the detailed eyes in the previous painting. I think i'll thin it/shrink it a bit though, yeah, because you really need to be able to look into the eyes. It's probably a good idea.

[Archie]

Ah, fair enough then. I've had that problem with eyes before.

My most recent drawing, there wasn't any detail in the eyes on the source photo either, just solid black. So the highlights ('corneal reflex' it's called, apparently!) have to be positioned spot on to get the look right. I got them right but ended up sticking pupils in there anyway - you can only see them if you look really closely because the eyes are so dark, but I know they're there.

I love 'doing' eyes too, and the detailing on them on your first painting here is great. I drew Jodie Foster once, the source photo of which was obviously photoshopped as the eyes looked pretty wrong, so I made them up completely. Much better.

I do have a little constructive criticism on your latest, if you'll allow.

[Number 28]

Go for it. Is it the glass eye?

[Archie]

Go for it. Is it the glass eye?

Uh, no.

I ummed and aahed about saying anything for a while as you haven't finished yet, but the shape of the mouth doesn't look quite right to me. If you flick back and forth between the source and painting in a slideshow it looks like you've curved the bottom lip a bit too 'early', if that makes sense? Also, the tooth nearest her hand (ahem) looks too short.

I'm not sure though, whether this is mostly because you haven't started with strong shading and detailing there yet. Darker shades make a hell of a difference with something like that and that may be all that's needed, in which case my comment is superfluous.