Another Special Portrait

This is another special portrait of a very glamorous lady called Val who sadly is no longer with us. Her husband, Maurice, has commissioned this painting from a very clear photograph (which always helps) and I'm changing the blue feathers to red! I started with a primed 16 x 20" canvas board and sketched her in a portrait format. When I was happy with the likeness and composition I applied areas of flesh coloured acrylic paint by mixing cadmium red, white and yellow ochre, and dark brown for her hair and eyes. I continued to use glazes of colour to build up the varying skin tones by including crimson, violet, cadmium yellow and raw umber into the mixes. I like to get the eyes and mouth right early on in a portrait as this is where the character of a personality of the person starts to shine through. I haven't put all the dark areas in yet but the shapes and hues and tones have placed them nicely. I added some red feathers to help me visualise where this colour might reflect on the face. Now with the basic layers of colour laid down I am working on tonal values to bring her out of the canvas. Keep posted as there's still some work to go...