Rangefinder Magazine
May 2005

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Painting Faces by Karen Sperling

Many photographers are intimidated by the thought of turning their photo portraits into paintings in Painter. They think they couldn’t possibly know how to paint eyes, noses, mouths and hair. While artists would like you to think that only they can paint faces, the truth is, anyone can do it.

The secret is a commonly known art concept: Instead of painting objects like eyeballs and nostrils, paint highlights, shadows and midtones. When you do so, you will be able to paint anything you’d like to paint.

To make your life even simpler, choose photos that show these tonal contrasts clearly.

Here are the steps to turn this photo into this painting in Corel Painter. I used Painter IX and its Artists’Oils brushes, but you can use Painter 8 or earlier, as you’ll see in the following steps.

Open a photo in Painter (File > Open).

I chose this photo by Los Angeles-based photographer Scott Stulberg for this tutorial because I could see the areas of contrast clearly and because it is a good pose.

I chose File > Clone and named the clone (File > Save As). I kept the original photo intact in case I needed to get back elements of it later. Also, I turned on Canvas > Tracing Paper to see parts of the original as I painted. Don’t forget to turn off Tracing Paper occasionally as you paint because the brush strokes are lighter when you paint with it on, so it can be misleading.

I decided on a color scheme of adjacent colors on the color wheel, including red-violet (for the lips and bodice); and red, red-orange, orange and yellow-orange for the skin and hair (all combined and in varying values and saturations for the skin). I used the same colors in the background, and I used the complements (colors opposite on the color wheel) blue and blue-green for shading. Using the same colors in the foreground and background is called color harmony, and it’s something that makes your paintings harmonious.

figure 1

I began by blocking in colors on the face with the Chalk’s Square Chalk variant (figure 1). In Painter 8 or earlier, you can use this brush together with the Blenders’ Smudge to capture an oil-painting look. But in Painter IX you can get an even closer resemblance using the Artists’ Oils. I started with the Chalk even though I was going to use Painter IX because I wanted more subtle strokes for the face to start with. I like smoother rather than rougher strokes on the face, but you can add rough strokes if you prefer.

Using the Artists’ Oils Bristle Brush and Blender Brush in Painter IX, I painted areas of light and dark based on what I saw in the image. If you don’t have IX, use the Chalk’s Square Chalk and blend with the Blenders’ Smudge tool. I chose colors in my color scheme and painted based on the lights and darks I saw in Scott’s photo. I used a previous color by holding down the Option (PC: Alt) key, clicking on the color I wanted, and painting where I wanted it. For instance, I painted the girl’s right arm first, and then to repeat a color from the right arm on the left arm, I Option/Alt-clicked on the color on the right arm then painted on the left one.

When using the Artists’ Oils, to paint with the color full strength, lift the brush, paint, lift the brush, paint. To blend with adjacent colors, keep painting without lifting, and you’ll see that the colors blend.

You can use the Blender Brush (or any Artists’ Oils brush) as a blender with no color by moving to zero the Amount Slider located in the Window > Brush Controls > Artists’ Oils palette.

If you save and close your image, be sure to save in Painter’s native RIFF. This will keep the artists’ oils wet so you can edit them the next time you open the image.

	figure 2

I did the face quickly just to add color and figured I’d go back to it later. I proceeded to paint areas of light and dark in the hair, arms, bodice, neck and background (figure 2, page 67). I left the hands and figured I’d do those later, too.

figure 3

At this point, I turned my attention to the face. All of the interim images are pretty cool as paintings (figure 3, page 67), but I wanted to get the face to look as much like the original photo as possible.

You may think you can never paint like this, but you have to believe me, all I did was paint areas of light and dark. I have definitely gotten better with practice, but less in terms of dexterity and more in terms of observing where the lights and darks are. I can tell you from experience walking around the room at my Artistry Painter Retreats and seeing how the students are doing, the ones doing “better” are just observing what’s in the photo better. If you see one side of the face is lighter than the other, then paint it that way. And don’t be afraid to use the Photo category’s Dodge and Burn variants to lighten and darken, respectively. The key is the ability to tell that one side is lighter than the other, and that’s what I’ve learned to do. I had the original photo and the painting side by side on the computer. I toggled Tracing Paper on and off, but the more paint you have on the image, the harder it is to see the original through tracing paper.

After trying and trying, I finally got the face to look right. I just finally followed the lights and darks in the image. Also, I cheated a little. I brought in the photo as a layer and used it as my guide to paint in the canvas.

To make the photo into a layer: (1) Make the photo window the active one. (2) Select all (Cmd/Ctrl-A). (3) Select Edit > Copy. (4) Make the painting the active window. Select Edit > Paste. The photo is now a layer in the painting and is listed in the Layers palette, accessed from the Window menu.

Sometimes the layer comes in off-center. To line up the photo layer with the painting, press Return (Enter). This brings up the Layer Attributes dialog. Type “0” in the Top and Left fields next to Position. Click “OK.” The painting is now centered.

Here’s how to paint using the photo layer as your guide: (1) Turn down the Opacity slider in the Layers palette until you can see the painting and layer. (2) Click on Canvas in the Layers palette. (3) Paint. Your brush strokes go in the canvas.

I painted in the canvas with the layer showing, and then I hid the layer by clicking on the eyeball next to it in the Layers palette to see my progress. Then I opened the eye again and kept going.

I couldn’t always see what I was doing in the canvas with the layer showing. A lot of the painting was guessing by painting in the canvas what I saw in the layer, then hiding the layer and adjusting the strokes.

To make the face look more like the photo, I used the chalk to fix the size of areas, like the eyes, and I painted with the Photo Dodge and Burn tools to adjust dark and light areas, like around the mouth.

	figure 4

At this point I did the hands, painting areas of light and dark. I painted narrow lines with the chalk moving the Size slider in the Property Bar to the left—see the insides of the fingers (figure 4).

Then I moved the Size slider to the right for wider strokes and painted lighter areas and darker areas like on the fingertips. A little paint goes a long way in paintings. You don’t have to include every line and crevice because you don’t see the fingers this close up when you view the printed image. So think in terms of suggesting areas of light and dark, and use the photo as your guide for where to put those light and dark strokes.

Then I blended it all together by painting with the Blenders’ Smudge.

Next, I smoothed over some of the strokes. I had painted bold brush strokes with the Artists’ Oils Bristle Brush, but they lay on top of one another. I wanted them to blend more.

You can adjust the amount of blending for the Artists’ Oils in Painter IX in the Artists Oils’ palette. This palette is in the Window menu under Brush Controls. There’s also an Impasto palette in Brush Controls, where you can adjust the Depth (actually, height) of the brush strokes.

However, I’ve played with these sliders for hours, and while you can get some cool effects with the Artists’ Oils sliders, they’re random. You can’t control them.

And I don’t like the result with adjusting the Impasto slider because the stroke is uniformly one height throughout.

Instead, I have found that painting with the default settings with the Artists’ Oils and then painting over them gives me more control.

figure 5

First I “lowered” the depth of some of the Bristle Brush variant strokes by painting over them with the Impasto category’s Depth Equalizer variant (figure 5, page 68).

Then I used the Square Chalk with Resat in the Property Bar at 0 percent and Bleed at 49 percent. Then when you paint, you can blend the strokes. I was looking to blend where the strokes began and ended to make them look more natural.

I added scribbly lines using the Pens’ Scratchboard Tool and some more brush strokes to the bodice. I added some shading to the eyes that wasn’t there in the original photo.

	figure 6

It’s generally accepted art technique to look at the eye as a sphere having light and dark areas that are created by the way light strikes the sphere. So you’d see shadows cast by the eyelids at the top of the eyes and catchlights at the pupil and iris where the light hits the eye. The areas at the corners would be darker as the eyeball sphere recedes into the socket.

Painting the nose has another set of art theories (figure 6, page 69). It’s generally accepted that you’d see highlights on the bridge and on the tip where the light would hit and that the area below the nose would be darker than the area above because the area below is in shadow. I painted these additions with the Square Chalk and blended with the Smudge, except the shadows on the eyes, which I painted with the Airbrushes’ Digital Airbrush.

The art theory behind painting lips is that the top lip is always darker because it is in shadow and the bottom lip is always lighter because the light hits it.

The same light and dark theories apply to painting hair. You don’t have to paint hair strand by strand. Just paint areas of light and dark to suggest the hair.

Now tell the truth—that wasn’t so difficult, was it?

Artist, author and photographer Karen Sperling is a Painter expert. She wrote the manuals for the first several versions of Painter and has authored several Painter books. She currently publishes Artistry Painter tutorials on CDs and as downloadable files from her site, in addition to Artistry Tips and Tricks, a newsletter in which she answers Painter questions. Karen leads Artistry Corel Painter Retreats. She paints commissioned portraits for her own clients and as a subcontractor to photographers, and her art will be part of a group show at the Art Institute of California in May. Visit: www.artistrymag.com/.