Tablet painting in stages (image heavy)
 

This evening I decided to do a tablet painting of the lovely Samaire Armstrong and save it in stages (partially so you can laugh at how bad the initial drawing is...). I haven't finished it yet, but here's what I've done so far:

http://www.ifsra.co.uk/images/sg1
Stage 1 - I did a quick sketch to rough in the general proportions, using 3 ruled guidelines to establish the rough height of the top of the head, the top of the eyebrow, and the bottom of the chin.

http://www.ifsra.co.uk/images/sg2
Stage 2 - I created another layer, and made a rough painting to block in the main areas of colour.

http://www.ifsra.co.uk/images/sg3
Stage 3 - I created a new layer for the main painting. I copy a section of the original photo and drag it over, so that I can work on it closer (zoomed in) whilst still being able to see the original. I do most of this work with a fairly soft brush, shrunk down to around 2-10 pixels depending on what I'm doing. Working close in lets you get a lot of detail in easily, but it normally means you will have to retouch the image as a whole a lot in the later stages, as it's easy to get broader tonal/spatial relationships wrong.

http://www.ifsra.co.uk/images/sg4
Stage 4 - I went on to work in the broad detail of the nose.

http://www.ifsra.co.uk/images/sg5
Stage 5 - Followed by the mouth.

http://www.ifsra.co.uk/images/sg6
Stage 6 - And right eye.

http://www.ifsra.co.uk/images/sg7
Stage 7 - I then went on to block in the rest of the skin tone more accurately. I personally find skin hard to draw with a tablet atm, probably because I don't use the brushes available very well. I find it tends towards looking too smooth and plastic.

http://www.ifsra.co.uk/images/sg8
Stage 8 - I then made a start on the hair (I rubbed out a lot of the original blocking in before I started the hair, as otherwise it tends to spoil the edges). As with the skin, I feel that I don't really use the photoshop brushes well here. I do the hair simply as lots of individual lines, trying to follow the general shape/tonal values, which is a very laborious and not too effective way of doing it. Any advice is more than welcome.

http://www.ifsra.co.uk/images/sg9
Stage 9 - I did some detail work on the earrings. I normally cheat when I'm drawing none-organic objects like these, and rule some lines across to get the proportions correct. If I don't, I usually find they're obviously out of proportion.

http://www.ifsra.co.uk/images/sg10
Stage 10 - This is where I've got to so far. I slipped in a scan of some linen as an "overlay" layer to give the picture a little texture. I will probably continue to try and work a bit more detail into the skin and hair, and work the features slightly to try and catch the expression better over the next few days if I get the chance.

I enjoyed it a lot, especially how you compare the two stage by stage. The final image seems a little older than the picture though... maybe because of the heavy lines on her cheeks? Still, very nice resemblance!

That was terrific, great job! The neck still needs some work though.

Nice work! :thumbsup:

:thumbsup:

That's almost a tutorial.. :D

Great work, think I'll use this to improve my own skills...
:)

Wow, love your work on the eyes, almost couldn't tell the difference. Really appreciate and enjoy the step by step process.

dang! good work, dude.

the most glaring thing i would like to see changed is her two front teeth.
you made them much narrower. maybe i am noticing cuz i recently had front teeth dental work done myself?

but yeah. good skills.

That's some amazing work. You've made me want to make a purchase on a Tablet. How much do they go for?

Thanks for the comments.

Tablets vary a lot in price. I use an A4 working area NISIS pad, which cost £70 or thereabouts. It works fine for me, but I'm not really very used to the world of graphics tablets. Most people say that WACOM ones are the best, but they're far more expensive. Personally I've always found past a basic point you can get the same effect with all artists materials, the expensive ones are just there because a lot of people will buy the most expensive by default. Provided it has a good range of pressure sensitivity and a good returns policy, I'd pick up a relatively cheap one.

The main mistake I made in buying a tablet was buying one that was larger than I really needed - if I was buying another I'd probably just get an A5 one. Because most of the work I do on a tablet is relatively tight, it's mostly done zoomed in. The only reason to have an A4 (or larger tablet) would be if the single marks you were making were particularly large - 20cm+. Most the marks I end up making on a tablet are more like 0-5cm.

I've spent a few more hours fiddling to try and capture the expression/likeness better, and playing around with the brush effects to try and get used to using a tablet. To try and get a better likeness, I firstly made a copy of my work (I'm a coward), then went about copy/pasting areas of the painting layer, and free transforming them until they were better positioned. I then worked back into them with a brush.

http://www.ifsra.co.uk/images/stage11

Most parts have had some subtle tweaking, the main areas that I've changed are:

1) Bringing the right side of her face in (lhs of the painting) as it was too wide

2) Lowering both eyebrows, as they were too arched

3) Making the eyes slightly larger

4) Making the teeth wider (thanks Bernadette)

5) Reducing the height of the hair, it was too big

6) widening the forehead slightly on the left temple

7) Widening the bridge of the nose slightly

8) Lowering the smile creases on both sides (they were both far too high)

9) Bringing the left cheek out wider

10) General work on the skin tone


The main things I'm still not happy with are:

1) The eyes seem slightly small - I don't think they technically are, but something is giving the effect

2) The skin tone

3) Some of the lines are too dark

4) The hair

5) The eyebrows (they look a bit like they've been drawn on with marker pen)

Very good! That takes some skill

Wow nice work

nice work
 

Wow nice work

I thought you had copied and pasted the eyes when I saw them. Amazing work. It makes me want to buy a tablet!

jesus dude.........fuckin' awesome step by step.

totally enjoyed that....thanx

How long did it take, in hours, to compeltely finish this project? It came out great, and I'm a big fan of Samire Armstrong. I thought about drawing a picture of her once. I haven't thought of it ever since, but seeing this inspired me to draw her and get a tablet.

i have to agree, you are indeed talented....holy shit.

id be honored to see anything else you do in the future.

Good lord. Incredible. As an artistically challenged person, I am blown away. :-)

That is absolutely unbelievable.

-Lasereth

wow. That is great work. I go about portraits in the same way. Perhaps I should invest in a tablet.

Kudos :thumbsup:

I'm assuming fetal position in awe.

Beautiful subject man... and excellent work! Kudos!

Your skills makes me goosey all over!

Your eye for detail is oustanding so I take it that you've been doing this for years. Do you paint a lot or do you only do tablet work?

Heya, thanks for the comments.

The entire project (although I've not gone back to finish it yet) took about 10 hours to the last stage I posted here. Pictures like this tend to take me longer the further I get into them - I got to stage 2 in about 30-40 minutes, stage 7 in about 2 hours, stage 10 in about 4 hours then another 6 hours or so to stage 11. Even though there don't look to be so many changes between 10 and 11, that's what really takes the longest for me - deciding what I've done wrong, and changing it subtly.

I find the hardest things to draw are skin and hair. Hair is hard to draw accurately due to its detail, but you've got a lot of leeway about what you do with it because people's hair moves. I find skin hard to paint because it's built up of a huge patchwork of hues/shades, which you need to pay close attention to in order to get the texture right (so the person doesn't look like they're made of plastic). In addition to this though, it also has crucially important broader tonal variations that create the shape of the face/expression. Getting them both working together in a "realistic" painting is something I find difficult.

I'm 25, I have a B.A. hons. in illustration, and I've been drawing/painting as long as I can really remember. When I was younger I tended to do much more "realistic" work. Over the past 5 years or so I've wanted to get away from that, and experimented with a lot of different ways of working. Over the last 3 years I've been working on developing a style which incorporates the things I love (painting/drawing/textures/photography/layering), and I tend to find bringing things together in photoshop the best way of doing this.

I'm not really used to using a tablet. I bought one 8 months ago to try and make the work I do in photoshop less seperate from the physical work I do. I did this picture to practice my technical skills using a tablet, so that I've (hopefully) got more control over the work I produce (and as an excuse to look at Samaire Armstrong for a few hours...).

I've done some work for magazines/exhibitions over the last few years, but recently I've just wanted to focus on trying to improve my style/technique. Right now I'm putting the finishing touches to a website, and also scouring around for a good cheap way of getting my work printed on to canvas, because as much as I love photoshop I think it's important to have work as a physical artifact in some ways. I will start sending my work off to various people again later on this year.

Phew, sorry, that ended up being longer than I expected.

Me too! I've yet to discover a technique that makes the hair I draw much more realistic :|


Impressive!

If you've been doing this forever then it must mean that you have lots of works lying around. I don't suppose I could persuade you into posting more of your work? :)