I draw for moments like this

Today was a pretty good drawing day overall. I spent a lot of time on portraits and hands, and a lot of things clicked in those areas.

The nose, on this next one, shows an effect of light that I see all the time and have never managed to portray. I should keep it so I can keep referring back to it and figure out what I did.

But this next drawing is the one that really made me happy. It is a good likeness, and portrays the things I most wanted to: the lean of the head, the darkness of the eye that was reminiscent of a skull. This, as much as anything, is why I draw: for the rare moments when I look from the person to the paper and see the same thing coming to life under my hand as I’m seeing standing before us on the platform. They’re electric:

It was so satisfying that I was very jazzed to follow it up with a long pose–more time, more time, please!–and we did have a 40-minute pose (we don’t always–usually the longest is 20 minutes). It doesn’t work as well, though, and the face doesn’t look like his. I like the left hand a lot, and the shadows. I just never took the time to step back and see the overall effect, or I would have known that I needed to smooth out some of the dramatic shading (it looks garish on the right arm and left leg) and deal with the background, which is inconsistent and confusing.