While I was at the Illustration Master Class in Boston, I picked up oil painting again. (Well, I actually oil painted in college, but let’s just say that oil paint and I parted on bad terms). Yet after studying fantastic artists like Rebecca Leveille Guay and Dan Dos Santos, it began to dawn on me that there were more than one way to use oil paints (shocker! I know…)So before the week at IMC was out, I was determined to crack open my tubes of oil and get some paint on my hands. After all, I was surrounded by oil painters—was this not the best place to give oils a second chance?After watching Dan Dos Santos’ painting demo, I asked him for some pointers and suggestions for an oil study I had started. I showed him the simple sketch I did, loosely based off of a bad reference photo I found online.
Half-expecting the “just keep trying” speech that some people give, I was surprised when Dan kindly offered to help walk me through the steps. But first he reminded me that if I’m painting realistically, I’ll have to have proper lighting for accurate referencing. (By the way, did I mention that I’m terribly lazy at acquiring good reference shots? “I can just figure it out in my head…” always seems to be my lame excuse.) But I was there to learn, so I grabbed a couple friends to help take a photo of my face with better lighting. Using the lighting reference shot, I shaded my sketch and showed it to Dan.
He gave a couple suggestions (move the eye back a bit and broaden the neck slightly—it’s amazing what other people see in your drawing that you don’t), then instructed the next step of spray fixing the pencil sketch, and then toning it with a couple light layers of burnt sienna acrylic washes.
Next, Dan showed how to seal the acrylics and create a matte base for the oil paints by covering the piece with a couple light coats of matte medium mixed with molding paste (spelled like “molding”, yet pronounced like “modeling” pasted. Why? One of the mysteries that the world will never know…)After the matte medium/modeling meddling molding paste mixture dried, it was time for the main stage production: oil paint! I felt my heart beating fast as I hefted my box of archived oil paints to the table where Dan was sitting, nervous of totally botching up this beautiful medium in the presence of so many professional oil painters. But Dan was ever gracious and helpful as he arranged a basic limited palette with which I could start, and showed how to lay down the first base layers.
Next, Dan had me mix three different swatches of skin tone, and lay them in while heavily referencing my lighting photograph, all the while being careful to not muddy the shadows that I had previously put down.
Things started to blend together as I continued to paint, and Dan demonstrated a few handy tricks when it came to facial features.
Also, it is essential to maintain proper nutrition throughout long bouts of painting...
“The Passing of the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup” Recreated in the style of the Sistine Chapel (Courtesy of Christine Rhee)
But eventually after all the focusing, hard work, (and peanut butter cups), it all was worth it. I was pleased with my first oil study that I had done in over seven years.
I still have a lot of practice to do, but it’s a start. Thanks Dan for the crash course!