Oil Painting Of My Daughter

Drawing on a 16x20 Canvas

 My daughter will be graduating next summer and one of the things she ask me for was a portrait painting.

I had taken a couple of photos of her along side our pond. I decided a full frontal photo would not work for my portrait.

Instead, I snapped one of her with a slight profile. This angle allows for deeper shadows and will have more interest once I begin the painting.

              

Photo was enlarged and Photoshop

First, I used Photoshop to enhance the colors of the hair and skin. I also made her eyes more vivid.

To save time and to have the subject's face proportionate I pieced together four 8x10 imagines to the size of the subject I wanted. For this project the canvas size is 16x20. I pieced the photos together like a puzzle to create the above photo.

I love to sketch but I am not as accurate as I would like to be. Some artist view this as cheating. The way I look at it as saving time. One of the tools I would like to eventually buy is a projector so I will not have to go through piecing and taping large pieces together to get the right imagine!