New Year Lady Di stipple portrait

Here what I have done during short breaks between work and baby nursing, hedcut of Diana Princess of Wales.

Corporate stipple portraits

Here are some of corporate hedcuts done last period.

New Ray Liotta hedcut. Old one which I created few years ago is not so bad, but new portrait I think is much better.

Some words about hedcut technique.

This is one of my recently done hedcut for one web project. The number of stipple portraits drawn for this client is already over than 30 and I was very happy to work with them.

When you draw for the same client for years the most difficult thing is to keep the style which you have been using all that time for his portraits. Dot size and detailization level should still be almost the same. You draw portraits for another client with differents requirements and it may cause the changes in draw technique. What you have to do here is to keep an eye on previous hedcuts from this series while drawing the next one.

Finally you learn to switch easily but this is the dead end track. What you really need

Hedcut portrait of Rowan Atkinson

Here I tried new pen sizes, as I tend to bolder hedcuts last time. Two days since receiving mail package with Pigma Microns. I was thinking what face to test, finally I stopped on Rowan Atkinson as Walter Goodfellow from 'Keeping mum' (2005). First of all I needed vivid and contrasted features. For another thing I knew that in process of subduing new pens I may be have to redraw the hedcut, making corrections etc, so I didn't go wrong and chose face that wouldn't annoy me.

Finally I liked the result with bolder pens, they are press-sencitive and I could vary the bolndess of the stipple without changing the size. Though I'm not sure I will use these concrete sizes for the hairs, I need something more delicate I suppose,

Stipple portraits of Shaun Evans and Roger Allam

Portrait is clickable

I had some free time and drew new hedcut. If you ask me what I call 'true detective' I wouldn't tell you about stylish criminal drama with haggard Matthew Mcconaughey. What I think first is british TV series about young inspector Morse and Fred Thursday with amazing actors Shaun Evans and Roger Allam respectively. Here they are, 'Endeavour' stars stippled by me on group hedcut portrait.

Some time ago I decided to continue my exercises with crosshatching. Usually I use only dots/stipples on hedcut, even on suits drawing, and very few lines where it needs, for example on hedcut contours or curles forming. On this artwork I did crosshatching on coats and it was interesting to play with lights and shadows on folds. I think I will continue with this technique, in some cases it's much more effective than stipples.

Here is a larger fragment.

I didn't spend much time on background, I'm sure it should be subtle and non distractive here.

Philip Seymour Hoffman hedcut

Recently I had rewatched 'Happiness' (1998) and again enjoyed how genius Philip Seymour Hoffman played perverted sociopath. Right after the movie I was drawing his portrait: such an expressive and textured face is really great for stippling.