The concept of working in reverse to form our picture, was intriguing. We had to select an image (the suggestion in the example, was a self portrait) but I chose the one of my husband, dressing up as Wolverine. I wasn't intending to do the whole claws thing, just draw his face.
As much as I loved the ghostly effect of cutting into the charcoal with an eraser, I quickly realised the paper I was using, wasn't compatible. As I couldn't remove all of the charcoal, to reveal the white paper, underneath. It was quite frustrating, but I had to press on!
While I think I obtained a "likeness" of my husband, in some aspects - the portrait kind of morphed into someone completely different. Which was okay, as the exercise wasn't about achieving a picture-perfect likeness. It was more about exploring the different values between light and dark.
One of my favourite things (it seems) is cutting into the charcoal with an eraser. As it added a textural element to the background. One of the most challenging aspects however, was achieving finer details, such as the eyes.
Even my thinnest stick of charcoal, was 6mm wide. With such a bulky implement on such fine detail, the eyes were too misshaped for my liking. As well as too cartoony, with an outline. I really struggled with variation, in those limited spaces though.
On the whole, it was still an enjoyable exercise.
I like the second one although it's not like David as I remember him from your photos. So...reverse drawing....do you cover the whole page with charcoal and then remove the bits you don't want with the eraser?
ReplyDeleteI actually just finished a second portrait Bev, which looks a little more like David. But I've never been able to get exact likeness with portraits, anyway, lol. I'll post about it tomorrow.
ReplyDeleteThe reverse portrait, began with a layer of smudged charcoal, then cut away the highlights with an eraser. Just add more charcoal, where the different light and dark values, appear. It takes a bit of fiddling between your charcoal and eraser, to get the effect you're looking for. It can be as realistic or abstract as you like.