After I have a solid initial layer on everything, It’s time to correct and refine anything that needs it, and start glazing. for this piece I’m glazing with Liquin, mixed with various amounts of pigment. I’ll start with darks, gradually pushing my values to where they need to be. i’m using similar colors to what I used in the foundation, but generally much more colorful/saturated.  for example, by slowly building up that shadow by her right eye [below] with more crimson and purple shades, the final result is a very warm but still dark area…and the lack of actual black or brown pigments prevents it from becoming too muddy.

glazing goes pretty fast, but the glaze does have to dry between each pass. the glazed darks on the face below were done in multiple layers (3-5) over a few days.  also, whenever I glaze, I use a dry brush to blend the edges of the glazed area into the already dry paint. and unlike the foundation, I don’t want brush strokes in my glazing, so I use very soft brushes (generally black or red sable) to lay them in.

Here [above] is a good example of how I start glazing my lights, before I work the edges with a dry brush. as with darks, I find I get much better results if I gradually reach the values I need through repeated glazes, rather than try and get there in one pass. a lot of this has to do with the aforementioned brush stroke issue, if the glaze is more opaque, it’s much harder to make it look like a glaze (a subtle color variation), and not a sloppy thin layer of paint.  It also yields a much richer result.

excuse the warping, these were taken at an angle to avoid glare

there is some progression of glazes [above] I promise, a couple of days worth. I make sure never to glaze lights with too much white, even in the harshest highlighted areas,  as I find it kind of screws up the temperature and can make things unintentionally cool (with the exception of the black painted areas which reflect a much cooler light).

i’m almost finished with the glazing [above], and while the figure looks close to where I want it, the background is looking a little too flat — so I re-painted it. I was looking for a more uniform look at the top of the piece, and a more layered look for the bottom where the figure degrades into the background to give the whole thing a little more depth.  It’s lost a bit in these pictures (as usual), but I think the change, though subtle, makes a big difference.

almost done, final pictures in the next post!