All smiles


dalesmiletOn a roll after painting Theresa yesterday, I painted another face. I was fortunate to have gotten the reference photo, taken in natural light, which is the most important consideration for a painted portrait. The smile is one of the most ubiquitous facial poses we see, but it is the hardest to paint. Smiles are the result of many different muscles contracting, if you don’t do a smile right, it looks like a grimace, not a desired effect. The next challenge in this painting is that I had just painted a young mother, in the bloom of life. Even though she and my subject here have very close to the same skin color, I could not use the same colors on his face, they would look unnatural. I am pleased with the smile and the colors, I need another subject now!


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