With this Sophia Loren’s portrait I did something I’ve never tried before. I got my kitchen timer that I use to cook things for a specific time and stopped and made scans after every fifteen minutes. I spent the first fifteen minutes studying measuring and making light marks with a 0.7 mm mechanical pencil with 2h lead. This is where I was when the buzzer went off.

This shows the technique that I use to do my portraits.

In the second fifteen minutes I continued to work with the 2h lead and the mechanical pencil. Notice I stayed on the left side of the sketch. Also, I was mainly interested in getting the direction of the hair. I wasn’t trying to shade in this step.

In the third fifteen minutes I started with a 0.5 mechanical pencil with 2b lead over the same area I had worked on with the 2h lead. I was doing shading in this step. I tried to get the darkness of the hair as best I could with out pressing too hard on the pencil. I also did the highlights in the earring and darkened the shadow inside the ear.

In the fourth fifteen minutes I went back to the 2h lead and did more of the hair on top of her head. Then I darkened it with the 2b lead.

In the fifth fifteen minutes I went back to the 2h lead and shaded more of her face on her right side. I also darkened the eyebrow and around her right eye and it’s pupil. I also worked on her nose.

In the sixth fifteen minutes I worked on the mouth, the teeth and her left eye. I used the hb lead on the mouth, the eye and nose.

In the seventh fifteen minutes I went to the 2b lead and darkened her left eye and the shadows of her mouth.

In the eighth fifteen minutes I went back to the 2h on the hair and then darkened it with the 2b. I also did her left earring and the shadow under her chin with the 2b lead.

In the ninth fifteen minutes I finished the hair, the neck and the back ground.

Wow, another excellent portrait Bob. It's really interesting and informative to see how someone as experienced as you approaches a portrait. Particularly, how you do the left side first, presumably so you don't rub away graphite with your hand as you draw. I really must start doing that, I'm always getting smudges It's also interesting that you only use 2H & 2b leads and yet you get such a wide range of variables.
Thank you for taking your time to share your technique with us.

BRB, as I stated before, I am a big fan of your work. Thanks for sharing this very valuable technique...

BRB. that good you have had left east picture, excellent, is one of my favorites and very good step by step of since you did it

For fun, I made a GIF animation out of Bob's scans. I reduced it in size, but it's still fairly large, so don't click on this if you're using a slow link!

[attachmentid=4489]

cool!!!!

Wow! Thanks Earnest. That is neat.

I down loaded it to my computer and it is real fast. But I have a p4 with a 3.o gigahertz processor and 512 meg of ram. Does anyone know if there's a way I can slow it down with Jasc Paint Shop Pro 7?

On second thought, I can put the scans in a folder and set the screensaver as slow as I want it. ;-0

I edited my post and replaced the image with one that has a one-second delay between frames; the last one had 200ms.

That's even better than the screensaver. I think it's something like 6 seconds and that's a little too slow. Thanks.

BRB .. it can be slowed down in animation shop ....My husband does those for people and adds music to them .. I have a few of drawing I did with music that remind me of the person .
Good job Ernest it is nice to do that for friends .
BRB I was wondering if I could draw your drawing step by step ?

Bob, great WIP!
Ernest, cool.
Paulette

You have my permission.

Anyone is welcome to use any of my drawing or photos I've posted for practice.

I will even send you larger files if that would help you.

Oh, I went into my PSP and did one like Earnest's but I haven't learned how to put music to it. I'll keep at it.

Bob,

I adore your wonderful portraits. They are always full of life.
I hope you can earn lot of money with portrait drawing!

Ernest,
this was so cool - to put this as kind of film together!!!

awesome work brb. i really love all your work. and thank you for giving permission to use your work or photos for practice. i think i might give it a try. and use the timer thing too.
Lori

I enjoyed using the timer and I wish I had used it before. It lets me know exactly how long I take on a sketch and I can set it to take a break any time I want. I might do the next one and scan ever five or ten minutes.

Thanks Bob so much for posting this, it has been such a help being able to study your work. Please could I have your permission to print out this set of drawing. yours hopefully Kev

You have my permission. If you can't see the one's I posted well enough let me know and I can send you a larger file.

Thanks very much Bob, your an inspiration to us all