Skchy App Portrait : Tove Mar

We’re heading off tomorrow to New York for the painting event at the NY Botanical Garden.

I’ve been packing my kit, checking three times over to be sure I have everything.

I bring the minimum amount of gear on an outing, but that means I can’t forget even one tiny thing. I leave my binder clips at home and suddenly I can’t paint! I’m so used to using the same setup every time.

I find if I do a little sketch the night before a demo, then I know for sure I have all my usual tools.

I should be painting some flowers or something! I’m a bit worried I’ll be the least botanically-savvy artist in the garden. But I didn’t have a perfect subject handy – so I thought – been a while since I did a portrait from the Sktchy app.

Let’s do one just for fun.

Here’s some still frames from a video capture.

I’m getting pretty good at recording video :) but still a bit slow at processing it and getting it out to you. The editing and voice over is creating a little blockade. So the full video is going into the bank till I have time to get my backlog handled.

This sketch is a classic application of my mantra: Tea, Milk and Honey.

I’ve started the head with wet, diluted, washes of Perlyne Maroon, mixed with Buff Titanium, Naples Yellow, and a new blue I’m testing – Daniel Smith Verditer Blue (PB28, PB36, PW4).

The white cotton shirt is the same mix, in reverse proportions. This keeps a harmony in the sketch – and captures the transmitted color of skin underneath a thin t-shirt.

In my first wash I’m looking for a fuzzy silhouette of the lightest local colors. These days I’m trying to restrain myself as much as possible in the first pass. It should be a fuzzy, light filled shape, with no detailed drawing.

I always want to get to the details immediately. But you have to delay that gratification.

After allowing the first wash to dry, I can begin to lay Milky pigments over top of my transparent Tea.  Sometimes I’ll draw in a form like these lips – then lift or blend parts of it – to soften it into the under-painting.

I’m always trying to see how little I can draw.

I’m trying to do more with incomplete shapes. Leaving gaps of under painting, that bridge a distance between darks. Rather than literally drawing on the features – just imply their small shadows.

As the darks on the face begin to build up,  I transition to Honey mixes – less water, more pigment.

Also using darker colors such as Raw Umber Violet and Indigo. Essentially the same Magenta/Blue color harmony, but one notch darker in tone, and with less saturation.

The darkest darks are in the shadow under the hair – right behind the neck – and the pupil in the eyes.

And the last touch is a few dots of Grey of Grey in the (not quite) whites of the eye. It’s never pure white – that would be too strong.

So, no philosophy today! Just a simple sketch, trying to capture the softness of a young woman’s features.