More sketches

Two more character sketches for the painting I'm working on. On the left is the unkempt hunchback Hargreaves which would make the gentleman on the right Sir Langdon St. Ives. Naturally.

I always enjoy the referencing portion of a project. It gives me the perfect excuse to do things like go out to buy a bowler hat and shove clothes down the back of my shirt and bound around the living room like a man possessed.

I had a teacher in school who impressed upon us the importance of finding people capable of acting to use as models. Because of that I use myself as a model a lot, as I think I've mentioned before. I have a hard time directing people to get the performance I want out of them, so I find it's simpler to just play dress up myself and snap a lot of pictures. Insisting to someone that they should look like they're having fun, or that they don't look angry enough, or crazy enough, or coy enough gets tedious after a while.

Thank goodness my wife can see into my head and can extract what it is I'm after through my awkwardly given direction. Since I don't know many people comfortable enough in front of a camera to not look stiff, I usually use myself as a male model and my wife for the ladies. It's worked pretty well so far, but I think people are starting to catch on...