Drawesome Prompt: #48 Finish a WIP

[eye_of_toad]

Title: Jared Padalecki
Artist: eye_of_toad
Rating: G
Fandom: Supernatural
Characters/Pairings: Sam Winchester
Content Notes: colored pencil layered over alcohol marker

I forget which season this publicity photo was from, but his expression amused me at the time and it was one of the first drawings I did in Sketchbook #1. (I've had many "sketchbooks" in the past, but I always tore out pages I didn't like until there were no pages left. 2017 was the first year that I vowed to fill up sketchbooks without tearing any pages out.) I hated the initial drawing and tried again in 2018 and was super impressed with my improvement, so after that it became a tradition to re-draw Jared Padalecki every year or so using the same publicity photo as a reference to see if I noticed improvement in my art.

I'll be posting more meta thoughts on my own journal, but the short version is that I don't think colored pencils are really my medium of choice, nor is realism my prefered style. I think it's good as an exercise to test myself once in awhile and see how realistic I can make something, but this is not my happy place and I think I'll be going back to more stylistic drawings for the most part.

Comments

[goss]

It must be so cool to look back at these and track your developing skills. You've captured him so well, and the shading is lovely. :)

art progress

[eye_of_toad]

I think I've hit the wall with colored pencils though. It's such a time-consuming medium and I'm very much an instant-gratification type of person. Next time I try one of these it will be ... ink? watercolor? Definitely something other than colored pencil.

[mific]

I like this a lot - he does have a very singular expression!

Jared

[eye_of_toad]

My biggest frustration is that I still don't think I've captured that expression.

I did an ink scribble a few years back that, while less realistic, did a better job of capturing that worried eyebrow.

[amberdreams]

I'ts a really fun idea to keep revisiting a reference like this!

art revisted

[eye_of_toad]

I wish I had a time machine and could tell my previous self to pick a photo reference without beard stubble in it. :-) This would have been so much easier if I'd picked a woman to re-draw every few years. (Now that I think of it, I should dig through my old sketchbooks and look for women to re-draw.) Beard stubble is the worst. :-)

[mekare]

Wow I admire your dedication to redraw this portrait regularly! It‘s really good, I especially like the colours in this.

re-draw

[eye_of_toad]

Thanks! And I do think that's the most notable improvment over the years. The shading/color isn't nearly as flat as my first two attempts.

[seleneheart]

I think the idea of revisiting the same reference every year is a great way to track your progress. And he looks fabulous!

revisiting old art

[eye_of_toad]

Thanks!

[tally]

Really excellent likeness! I'm particularly impressed with the texture of the hair!

♥

[eye_of_toad]

Thanks! The man has pretty hair.