From Photo to Art: Sabrina

One of my most challenging, yet rewarding commissions, was a portrait pinup illustration I did for a wine label.  I was hired by the owners of Wein-Bauer Inc. , a wine distribution company in the Chicago area, to create a pinup style color illustration for one of their vintages, and the model was to be their daughter, Sabrina Bauer.

The clients hired my photographer friend, Rob Domaschuk (who also shot the reference shots for me of Playboy model Carlotta Champagne.  Rob rented a studio in Elmhurst, where met Sabrina, her mother and her MUA friend.  Although this was Sabrina's first professional photography shoot, she was a natural pinup--striking beauty, lovely curves, and she took direction very well.  The session went very well, and after a couple of hours, Rob shot some nice pics, and we eventually chose the top photo as reference.

 I drew an outline of the photo in pencil on Bristol board,  and then proceeded to start coloring Sabrina's hair.  I wanted to add a lot of detail and contrast there. (2nd Photo)  I moved down to her face and arms to get the proper blend of colors for her skin tones.  Colored pencil is different than my normal medium, graphite, which I mostly blend with my fingers.  Colored pencil won't blend that way, so I needed to layer different colors on top of each other, then use the colorless blender to smooth out the edges.  It takes more patience on my part to get the desired results

I really concentrated on the skin tones and hair first, as they were the more difficult parts to capture.  As you can see from photos #3 and #4, I gradually built up the colors on Sabrina's arms and legs.  I also made her dress much tighter and shorter.  As you can see from the reference photos, I started working on her shoes at this point, trying to get a more slender shoe style.


In Photo #5, you can see that I had a the dress almost completed, and began working on the stool on which she sat. While I was still working on the skin tones, Sabrina was for the most part complete.  The drawing is being to take shape, and some of the minor elements, like the wine glass, are being detailed.

  

Photo #6 shows the completed drawing as delivered to the client.  Per their suggestions, the stool was changed completely from what I originally laid out.  the dress was white with blue tones to create the folds and shading, as was the stool cover (slightly darker).  I emphasized the tones in Sabrina's legs, with some white highlighting, and made her lips ruby red, as befits the retro style pinup. And I made her shoes into pumps, so they would be more slender to accentuate her legs.


Overall, everyone was happy with the product; however, it didn't photograph well and was too wide proportionately for the wine label, and couldn't be used.  It was disappointing, but Sabrina was very happy with  the art, and she took it for her personal use.  This made the whole project extremely satisfying--while I didn't make the cut for the label, a young lady was very pleased with the artwork, which is a great thing.

Learning From the Master Leonardo

I recently saw a documentary on our local PBS station about one of my favorite artists of all time, Leonardo da Vinci. One of my favorite artists of all time, and especially of the Renaissance, da Vinci was the true Renaissance man---artist, inventor, mathematician, scientist.  He is credited with being the first person to study the biology of the human body by dissecting cadavers, his notebooks filled with detailed figure drawings from those dissections.  He also studied how water moved, he even drew designs for the first flying machines

One of Leonardo's painting trademarks was the use of sfumato, which is a style that eliminates the use of contour lines and creates outlines with the use of color only. It gives the art a 'smoky' effect, which can add drama and realism to the painting.  One of his most famous examples is the portrait he painted known as Mona Lisa.

I have always been a fan of the sfumato technique, and often incorporate a version of it in my drawings.  Below is an example of my "Renaissance" style, an art class project I did, in which I borrowed heavily from the master of both technique and subject matter.  This Madonna and Child was drawn with charcoal pencil on charcoal paper, it was the preliminary drawing for a painting.  I tried to use the 'smoky' technique in the folds of Our Lady's gown, the background, and the skin folds.

In this drawing of  Playboy's very first Cyber Girl of the Year, Alicia Burley, I tried to use the shading to distinguish the various body parts from each other.  Alicia has such lovely curves, and this art seemed to lend itself to using a variation of the sfumato technique.

In my progression as an artist, it's important not to stagnate.  After watching this special on da Vinci, I have decided to try to incorporate the <b>shading sfumato</b> again in my art.  I hope you'll like it.