Oh, I struggled with the drawing on this one. Front view poses are always the worst! I don’t typically do a preliminary drawing when I paint, because with opaque paint I can tweak things as I go along. But this is an exercise with just burnt umber and Gamsol. Basically, transparent. (You can see the pencil lines in some places.) I KNEW I’d get something lopsided (and I did) but drawing in pencil beforehand mitigated the worst of it.
I see all the problems with the painting, but at the same time, a lot was learned from this exercise. And we’re not done yet! We’re going to be doing plenty more burnt umber pickout, and I’m up for it. I integrated some burnt umber pickout in a recent painting (I try to do daily small paintings) and it sold immediately! So Watts Atelier is already starting to pay off!
I’m not a novice at oil painting, but experience has taught me that I DON’T KNOW ANYTHING and boy, has this course confirmed that! So much more to learn! So many more techniques to explore! And let’s not even get into the drawing courses at Watts. So much to unpack there as well.
