From Photo to Art--Dana Dicillo

I used to have a membership to the old Playboy Cyber Club, and met many, many models there.  One was a feisty, petite Italian girl named Dana Dicillo, a Special Editions model who had big aspirations to become the shortest Playmate in history.  Dana was direct, to the point, and just very, very cute.

Being the atypical Playboy model, I thought she would make a perfect subject.  I looked through a lot of her pictorials (harder to get online in those days), and finally found this image in the May/June 2004 Special Editions Lingerie issue, shot by Andrew Goldman.

Dana obviously has a wonderful figure; her petite frame and smaller breasts are so different than most Playboy models.  What drew me in was her dark, expressive eyes.  I felt like she was almost looking through me.

I chose a very, very toothy illustration board for this image, and cut in quarters.   I figured that the rougher surface would challenge me to create more shadows and contrasts, since the reference photo had flat lighting.

Since this was a lingerie issue, she, of course, was shown in various stages of undress in her pictorial.  I frankly wasn't interested in the bra hanging below her breasts in the reference photo; I wanted to make this a full frontal nude.  I loved the up do with her hair, and thought about how interesting that could be in the final drawing.

I did get a chance to send it to Dana after I finished, she wrote back, wow, that looks like me!  I took that as a compliment.

You can see a larger version of the art work here.

From Photo to Art--Carlotta Champagne (The Very First One!)

I just recently discovered that, in all the time that I've been doing this series "From Photo to Art," I have never featured one of my favorites---the very first drawing I did of popular Playboy model Carlotta Champagne.  it also represents one of the first drawings where I "removed" the model's clothing.





















I originally met Carlotta online though the modeling site OneModelPlace.com, and we met in person at Glamourcon Chicago 2006.  I remarked how much I liked this photo of her, and asked her permission to use it.  She said she co-owned the copyright with the photographer, Keith Seraphim, but if it was okay with him, she agree.  Keith gave his permission, and I set out to draw.

I absolutely loved Carlotta's hair and expression in this shot; she looked so relaxed and beautiful.  But since she is a nude model, I wanted to try something different, and what would be better than to place her naked in a hot tub?  It wouldn't be all that difficult, since she is wearing a string bikini in the reference photo, I really only had to recreate her breasts without the suit, and I had plenty of photo references for that.  The tricky part of this drawing was drawing the hot tub and the water, I was not familiar with the surfaces, and I had more trouble than I thought.

This art has proven to be one of my post popular pieces, and the original was purchased by a photographer not long after I completed it.  I've used it on my Erotic Pin-up & Illustrations business card, my Glamourcon placard, and frequently as an avatar.  It was also featured in Carrie Leigh's Nude (you can read about it here).   Since the original is now sold, I've often thought about redoing this piece, to correct some things that I believe could be improved.  Any feedback on that?


You can see Vincent Wolff's art on Fine Art America