Portrait

Artists Take Risks...
1.) In this project I wasn't sure if I should use pencil or colored pencils while doing my portrait. At first I was thinking about shading with my pencil because that seemed easier, and I had more practice with that; but the picture I was using had a lot of color and if I just used pencil my project would have been boring. So towards the end when I was done sketching my portrait I decided to use colored pencils instead. Also when I was picking the medium the main thing I was worried about was the shading of my grandmother's face, because in a portrait, details and shading are a very important feature that you need to make your project more realistic. But later in my project I made the shading work with my colored pencils and I feel that when I added this material it made my picture come more to life
2.) I picked colored pencils that was pretty different for me, because I usually use pencils for portraits and sketching faces and their details. Pencils are much easier for me to use and I mostly use them anyway for the last projects so I wasn't sure how colored pencils would work especially for the shading part, but my project turned out really well.  The one struggle I have is doing portraits because there are so many details and it takes time to get them right and to make them realistic, so I didn't know what to do about that and it took me some time to get it just right. But with some practice and time my portrait started looking more realistic, and I really like it.
Artists Reflect
1.) While I was doing my project there were many times I stepped back and stopped to look at it, like how the details were and to see if my portrait was similar to my picture. But the main time I stepped back and analyzed my drawing was when I stared shading in the skin tone and when I was doing lightness and darkness to the neck and face. The colored pencils were very challenging to work with while shading the face, and I never could notice the darkness to the lightness like shown in the actual picture of my grandma.  After I had some help from my class mates and teacher and learned more on how to shade the face, such as having the light spots like shapes so I wouldn't get confused between the dark spots on the face.
2.)One idea I thought about before doing my project was the mediums, like should I use colored pencils, paint, pencils, oil pastels, etc. But when I was thinking about my mediums I also put in consideration what would make my picture look more realistic, and how good are the mediums to help me shade and add very descriptive details.  After thinking about what would be good for my project I finally picked colored pencils and I think this medium was perfect for this project.