Thetis - Side by Side

Side by side version of: [link]

This is a quite special piece for several reasons.

I've been away from painting for almost five months due family matters, but it feels like a year...I really missed it, and i needed some kind of push to plug my wacon again…

The perfect opportunity showed up when i ordered (and received of course) the outstanding book "Impressions" by
It's not only the huge amount of inspiration a book like that can bring you (and believe me, it's a lot!), but the fact that inside the book were an original sketch done by Marta herself (now hanging proudly in my bedroom's wall ).

Because of her hair flowing upwards, i imagined her like a mermaid or something like that, a sea creature, so i decided to transform her into Thetis, the nereid mother of Achilles

Obviously i asked her for permission to paint it, and here is the outcome! The first painting of a year I'm sure will be better than 2012!

I guess the result could be a bit better, five months without painting is a lot of time for me and i'm quite rusty, anyways i'm very happy with the final result.

It's obvious that i tried to emulate some aspects of Marta's style with very little success, but i have enjoyed the whole process a lot.

This time instead of working on the values first and then adding the colors, i started directly with the colors over the sketch. First with hard brushes (round mostly and some textured ones) and later with the round soft brush to render the face. When i had the painting done i added a curves layer to adjust a bit the color scheme and add some contrast.

Well, as always, any comment, fave or watch will be really appreciated, so thanks in advance!

Lines (Thanks!!!)

Colors