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Portraits with Style and the Best Brush for Sea Waves - My Process Video and Brushes!
🕑 Added 2025-10-24 16:08:42 +0000 UTCHi! Here are some thoughts and practical tips behind practice 73 and 74. Subscribe to unlock process videos, files, and more!
From Patrick Bateman to a Redhead
So, I wanted to make a portrait, but I spent way too much time searching for a reference I would like. I hate when that happens. I don't know what I want, but somehow I know what I don't want. If you check the video, you will notice how I started painting a very simple, beautiful woman with a frog on her head, but after a few minutes, I dropped it. I thought it was too boring.
Then I spotted very interesting lighting in a Patrick Bateman shot (American Psycho movie), but I eventually dropped it too because I feel I've been sharing too much pop culture/fan art lately. Luckily enough, I found this very nice reference, which had an interesting perspective and color. The lighting was not crazy, but I figured it would do.
I pushed her anatomy a bit more in order to add some style into the shapes, and I went crazy with textures in the hair. This will balance the lack of complex information within her skin. It's not a precise depiction of reality that I aim for when doing these sorts of practices, but a fun way to nail shapes through unconventional techniques and tools (brushes).
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Simple Shapes with Complex Composition
This was a simple yet beautiful reference. Although the plants are not that complex in structure, the combination of several plus the wide range of values makes the picture look interesting enough. A bit challenging but not really. As you can see in the process, the line art is very simple. What usually gives some trouble is the lighting and how the shapes of the leaves create shadows within the transparent body of the other leaves.
Another thing I changed in the practice was the contrast. For instance, in order to pop that highlight at the top of the plants, I just made the background a bit darker. These are small touches that boost the values just a little, in my opinion.
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Practice Chocolate Ice Cream and Broken Materials
I think this reference is great if you want to practice your volume/shadow game. The pieces of broken chocolate appear to be 2D planes, and each one generates a shadow within itself and projects another shadow to the right. This approach might be the same when making any broken surface, like pavement or walls, but the difference with this ice cream is that the surface of those fragments is smooth. You don't need to worry that much about texture, as I'm sure you will need to when trying other materials.
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Subtle Light for a Subtle Kiss
It was statue time, and these two were perfect for the job. The scene felt warm, and even though they are not made of flesh, I felt those hands holding her were beautiful. I think the lighting and colors were interesting, but the gesture sold me on this reference. I did not feel the need to change anything in the practice besides making the eyes a bit bigger.
The shadow shape was relatively easy to define, but the colors, on the other hand, were not. At first, I saw plenty of purple and blue in the reference, but at a close look, there were also some warm, soft tones in the light. Very, very subtle. The trick here is to suggest these tonalities as well, in order to balance the cold shadow.
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"Sampled Brush 141" Is Great for Waves in the Sea
I liked the mood in this picture but hesitated in painting it because of how complex the sea looked. I was not sure how many brushes I'd need to nail that texture, but thank God the brush called "Sampled Brush 1 41" did a great job. I used this brush mostly to make the shadows cast by the waves. Notice in the video how these strokes are often dark. I still used a few extra brushes to add lights and shadow behind these shadow shapes. This is a very edited photo, so a big part of the great mood was already done in the picture. I mostly practiced the way of painting the sea.
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Playing with Colors and Textures
I noticed very late that I was not recording the process in this one, but don't worry. This last practice was mostly a simple little challenge. I often leave the last one of the session as an extra since it's mostly late in the day and I'm a bit tired. What I enjoyed the most in this practice was the colors. A wide variation of purple tones added with soft and textured brushes. Simple yet fun.
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Practice 73/74 Process Video: https://youtu.be/Qlp1DhhD8eo
Brushes: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1wHu8wuEHjDk-VfnZqv8iy8rwnvu8Ngmj?usp=sharing
Pre-order my book Life in Every Sketch on the 3DTotal shop: https://rebrand.ly/The-Art-of-RamonN90
Please let me know if you have any questions!
