Wednesday, March 24, 2010

How I Paint Miniature Portraits




First, I paint the whole cameo with one soft background color. It hardly matters which color, usually a goldish, or faintly greenish, or mauvish. The portrait usually takes up the majority of the cameo anyway. The background color helps seal the plaster, so it doesn't keep absorbing the paint as I paint.

You can see two of my detail brushes here. Pretty small, and they get used up quickly. I'm always having to buy brushes, I'm tough on them.

Then I usually do a sketch in dark colors, hunter green, burnt umber, and maybe a little black.

7 comments:

People Who Know Me Would Say: said...

You gotta love an artist who oversimplifies what it is she does!

Do you pencil sketch?

I could read posts about your work every single day and not be bored.

moneythoughts said...

Have you ever given any thought to using gesso over the plaster as a sealer? I am sure paint works, but gesso, I think, would make your colors look brighter.

Debbiedoos said...

Was this a god given talent? Or did you actually take classes? I am always so impressed with people who can paint! I tried my hand at it once or twice...no god given talent here:)

lissa said...

I'm still wondering how you can paint in such small sizes & quite amaze a the results

Viki said...

You must have good eye sight. That you can paint so small in such detail.

~✽Mumsy✽~ said...

That's amazing how you can fit in details in such a small place.

April J. Ellington said...

Your ability to downsize an image is astounding. Back when I used to draw, I was able to do exact size replicas or only make them smaller by a little, but never to the magnitude with which you do it.

Oh, and I'm the worst painter in the world, lol. I was only decent with a pencil.

Great work!