For a while now I've been planning to challenge myself with a personal project, one that I haven't attempted since art school; a self portrait. I've been doing a number of editorial portraits lately, but this project felt very different to me. I'd explained to a friend that it was a completely different way of working on a portrait, because I sometimes knew what features were so familiar in their placement and colouration, I'd forget to look at my reference. That's not something I tend to run in to when I'm working on a portrait of someone I'm not very familiar with.
This image is the finished portrait. I'd taken a few process photos, but they were mostly terrible shots, so I'm not including those below in this post. I get questions concerning how I build a painting up, so I'll be sure and take better photos to share in the future.
I'm in the middle of a busy time, but wanted to clear my head and try something (sort of) new. After taking a few good long days to finish this, I'm back to work and feeling refreshed.
