Skip to content

Almost the last step

I’m almost there with this black and white painting of the naked couple lying on the beach. I knew when I started the painting that it would be difficult, although the client probably didn’t realise when they asked me why that would be.

The painting is of them lying together on a beach, with me working from photos that I took of them lying on a bed. So I took the photos and know they are of the right quality for me to work from. I have plenty of information to do the painting.

They wanted to be lying on a beach, with the sky with some clouds above them. No problem, I painted the sky and made that up whilst I did it.

They wanted the sea behind them, gently rolling in, and again, no problem I found a good source photo from one of my holidays in Turkey which is perfect and the sea looks great in the painting, just gently frothing and rolling in.

They wanted footprints in the sand to where they are lying, which is actually quite difficult, to get the right sized feet (as well as the left sized feet!) in the right size, with the right gaps between so that it looks like its their footprints spaced properly, and both sets of feet for the two of them doing that, and of course when the footprints get to them, then there will be scuffed sand where they are lying on the beach. So, the footprints are quite difficult… but I’m happy with the way they are looking at the moment.

The sand looks good and I like the way it is gently undulating as sand does.

Then, its the couple themselves, who are obviously the most important part of this painting, and need to look like they are actually there. And in that sentence is the main problem that I have been working on for the last couple of days. Because, although the photo I have to work from is great, the lighting in it isn’t the lighting that it would be if they were actually on the beach. So I have to change it. BUT, to change it means that their faces wouldn’t look exactly right as I have to copy what I can see to make it THEM. So the problem that I am trying to overcome at the moment is they look like they have been photographed with a flash, rather than are being lit by gentle sunlight above them. sky-sea-photo-comparrison-2

I will carry on working on this problem, but don’t know how I can improve on how its going to look. The most important thing is making it look like them. The rest is incidental……