You can paint a portrait in neutral tones
If you're just starting out with portrait oil painting, you should have basic drawing and oil painting skills in fine art before attempting this genre. You should have created a nine-tone value scale which is important for attaining correct skin tones.The most difficult part of painting portraits is getting the skin tones correct. Once that is mastered, you can begin developing technique and a distinctive style of your own. Like any new skill, practice turns beginners into masters.
Instructions
1. Mix light flesh tones on the palette. These color combinations will create graded tones starting with lightest skin tone, basic skin tone, warm flesh tone. Light 2 and Light 3 use the same colors. To warm up Light 3, use more cadmium red light.
Light 1: white, yellow ochre, cadmium red light
Light 2: white, yellow ochre, cadmium red light, cerulean blue
Light 3: white, yellow ochre, cadmium red light, cerulean blue
2. Mix halftone skin colors on the palette. The halftones are for light flesh tones.
Halftone 1: white, yellow ochre, cadmium red light, viridian
Halftone 2: white, yellow ochre, cadmium red light, chromium oxide green cadmium orange
3. Mix the dark skin colors.
Dark 1: white, burnt sienna, viridian, cadmium orange
Dark 2: burnt sienna, viridian, cadmium orange
4. Mix neutral skin colors.
Neutral 3: white, black, yellow ochre
Neutral 5: white, black, yellow ochre
Neutral 7: white, ivory, black, yellow ochre
5. Look through magazines for good photos of people with different skin colors, or use friends and family as subjects. Practice mixing the skin tones with the nine-tone value scale at hand.
6. Choose a photo of a subject to produce on canvas. Cover the mixed oil paint that isn't needed at this point and place in the freezer. It will be ready for use at a later date.
7. Using vine charcoal, begin to block in basic shapes on the canvas. Block the outer shape of the head using straight, angular lines. Leave out the details.
8. Separate the hair mass from the face by sketching in the lines around the face and forehead.
9. Picture the seam on a football and how the ball curves. Picture that seam on the face of your subject. Sketch that line from the forehead down to the chin. The central facial axis curves slightly just like the line on the football.
10. Indicate the position of the eyes, nose, and mouth with simple strokes of the charcoal.
11. Start shading in the shadows. Think of the face as having three tones: Light, medium and dark; shade accordingly. When you are finished, spray the canvas with hairspray to set the charcoal.
12. Begin painting in the tones, using the skills you learned in basic painting. One of the most important things to remember in fine-art portraits: soften the edges. You don't want your portrait to look like paint by numbers. Each tone should softly transition into the next tone. The outline of the head and face should softly transition into the background.
