Portrait #1 DONE!

Lorna and Morfar, Graphite on Paper, March 2009

C'est finis!  (Original here.)

I thought it was finished last night. Then, I got crazy this morning and started tweaking it, which is generally NOT a good idea (once you think you might be done). I usually go a few steps too far and regret it. Didn't do that, but I'm absolutely FIGHTING the urge to tweak further.

I'm sad to say I do have some problems with this drawing. It's about 15+ years since I have worked with pencil/graphite so I'm learning the medium over again (and learning the limitations of my eraser!)

Morfar's face is a bit overworked, and not right, and baby Lorna is not as solid looking as I'd like, but I'm afraid of ending up with her being overworked.

It's not too bad for my first portrait effort after a HUGE drawing break though.

Now on to portrait #2!  Wahoo!

I made some shrimp curry.

I think food photography is cool.

iPhone charger

Birthday balloon and flowers

Father on the computer, son in his lap.

A boy and his grandfather, on the ranch

A boy and a goose

Here are a couple of recent sketches.

The first one is for a bunny painting I did for a little friend on her first birthday.


The second one is the third version of some preliminary sketches I've done for the giveaway.


I think, after the third try (it was the charm I guess!) I am getting there with this latter drawing.

Will keep you guys updated with these pieces as I work on them!

Wild horses appeared

Huajatollas -- The Breasts of the Earth

And the final winner is...

 

Jacira!

And here's her photo:

All right, now I'm off to go work on some art!  Wish ME luck this time!!

Winner #4 -- Ted

Ted with a picture of Teddi!

Winner #3 -- Rose

Winner #2 -- Patrick

Winner #1 -- Allison

Oh there were so many good photos.  So many I'm bummed to not be working on!  But it's time to start letting you know what some of the winning photos are...

And the winners are... (Part 1)

This competition has been a little bit educational for me. I learned a lot about communication and that my limited instructions can mean lots of different things to lots of different people.

You know, when I think portrait (especially one I'm going to draw) I think... one person, human, upper torso, and head. I knew I was going to get some variations on that. But I didn't expect LARGE group photos, photos with lots of scenery, photos of animals, photos of statues.

No worries peeps! I'm not mocking your misunderstanding. But I am laughing at myself and how this sort of turned out to be a little game of "Chinese Whispers" or "Telephone" as Americans call it. Anyway, I really would have found it HILARIOUS to be doing a portrait of a Buddha statue or a camel as a result of this competition, so I left most of the entries in.

There were a lot of entries! 16 people and 44 images! Phew! I weeded out a few that just wouldn't be feasible for me to draw and then this morning I lept out of bed and ran to my desk to write down all the image names on little bits of paper. Then I thought that was so fun, so tactile, and so old-fashioned, I went and grabbed an actual hat to put them in!

My son didn't turn out to be too much help.  But I selected five images from the hat.  And here are the winners names...


(DRUMROLL PLEASE)

Haha!  Tricky me!  The last name and all the corresponding images to be revealed soon!  Stay tuned!

Bye Bye Papi

He went away on business for three weeks.  So we had to say goodbye for a while.