Need some comments on Sweeney, please.

[amusedjester]

Hi, all. I need some serious comments and advise here. I haven't painted for 10 years and my better experience is using oil paint on canvas. I haven't painted a model for 15 years and used an airbrush. I need some comments on this piece I am painting. It's sweeney todd from the movie.The face is about 1 inch high. I used Tamiya colors. diluted with iso alcohol. Initial base of flesh, shadowed with a purple mix. dabbed with white, highlighted shadows with magenta. and then washed again with a really thin mix of flesh. It's all by brush. Is there enough definition? is it too flat? Don't worry about being too harsh, I need honest, stark opinions here.
http://i137.photobucket.com/albums/q212/amusedjester/Picture1468.jpg
http://i137.photobucket.com/albums/q212/amusedjester/Picture1467.jpg
http://i137.photobucket.com/albums/q212/amusedjester/Picture1466.jpg

[amusedjester]

Nothing?!? Is it that bad? That's what I really want to know. Anyway, I redid the paints. I used an airbrush this time.
http://i137.photobucket.com/albums/q212/amusedjester/Picture1472.jpg
http://i137.photobucket.com/albums/q212/amusedjester/Picture1470.jpg
http://i137.photobucket.com/albums/q212/amusedjester/Picture1471.jpg

[riderV3]

While the likeness isn't perfect, I think the paint job is pretty swell!

[Danno]

You are off to a great start. OK...I really do not like to critique paint jobs to point out flaws...and especially paint work that I can only see photos of. It is way too hard to look at something on your computer monitor/laptop whatever, as it really depends on photo quality.

When I see these shots, I think your flash is on or that the photos look a bit over exposed and the undercut shadows are too drastic so it is very hard to tell what is going on.

But based on the pics, I can offers some suggestions. Now, these are just my opinion and in the end, it is you that needs to be happy with the overall look and feel.

His skin looks good, but maybe a tad bit too yellow. You may want to try and tone back the yellowness of the skin with a teeny tiny touch of purple to mute it down.

On the balls of the cheeks (just under the eyes), tip of nose, around the ears, third eye spot on the forehead, and chin, you may consider adding a touch of rosy warm flesh color to separate the more "yellow" skin and tonal separation. Try to keep thing subtle.

Use orange and browns to tint your base flesh color for shading work.

Use purple to tint the skin for work around the eye lids.

Use white to lighten your base skin color to add highlights

add a tiny bit of green to your flesh color and add a very slight (very very subtle) color to the areas where a beard/mustache would grow.

Again...these are only suggestions..things for you to try. Nothing works as well as have photo reference and using the colors you see on the actor/actress that you are trying to replicate.

[amusedjester]

Perfect!! I was hoping that you would comment on this Danno! I've read some of your replies and have always been very helpful and I appreciate the tips. This was a difficult beginning as the character has pale makeup on. I tried to incorporate purples and blues but they tend to get washed over with the air brush. I think I'll go over those areas you mentioned with those paints with a fine brush.
Thanks, too, Riderv3.

[de-compositions]

hey is this the full figure piece with the guy in the chair?

[fossa2]

OK...to me, overall, the whole piece looks very rough. I don't know if it's your paints or the sculpt itself. But the paints do look pretty blah/flat. Are you using the right type of paint(s)?
I can offer no help to improve it, Danno pretty much did all that for you, but I did just let you know how I see it :)