The Easy Way to Paint A Self-Portrait

There are lots of YouTube tutorials and detailed blogs out there on teaching you how to create a self-portrait. They are good, detailing everything for making your self-portraiture perfect, but it seems challenging to some people, and they give up the idea of self-portraiture even before they try. If you’ve been there, let’s make this job easier for you.   

 Before directly going to the painting tips, motivate yourself to paint one. First, we will discuss why one should make a self-portrait. 

Why Make a Self-Portrait?

Before the invention of the camera, or until s were not easily accessible, portraying oneself was considered a very respected practice. Even today, it is regarded as highly creative work. During this pandemic, while people are getting bored at their home having nothing to do, painting a self-portrait can be a good option to kill your time. 

Many people love changing their profile picture on different social platforms frequently. Uploading a self-portrait will sure get them extra appreciation. Do you know that a lower confidence level is an indication of a lack of self-love? A self-portrait on your wall will make you love yourself whenever you look at that. It will boost your confidence eventually. This self-portrait complemented with a nice photo frame will also increase the beauty of the wall on which it is placed.

Motivated enough? Then, let’s discover the tips to make it easy.

Which Type of Self-Portrait Do You Want to Have?

It can be a pencil or charcoal sketch. It can be drawn with a pencil and then painted with pastel colors. The most popular form is an oil-painted or watercolor-painted self-portrait. To get the best out of it, our recommendation is to go for the last one.

People nowadays paint on glass, clay plates, etc., but you can choose art paper as it’s an easy path. Ensure that you choose good-quality paper, higher gsm preferable.

Nowadays, some apps use AI to make a portrait using our camera-taken photos, but does it have any value? We all know that nothing can be gained without putting in some effort. The same applies here for painting a self-portrait. The portrait carries no value as there’s no effort involved in it. Besides, it looks fake too.

You can get personalized paint-by-numbers.

Things You Are Going to Need

Colors– There are no fixed colors for a self-portrait. Some love warm tones, some cooler. Adjust your contrast and saturation to your taste. Use a basic palette to color which will keep things simple.

Brushes– Avoid using a wide brush. It does the work quickly but has many problems. Its wide range overlaps with the section, mixes the color, and destroys the painting. Use a narrower brush and take your sweet little time.

Mirror– Your mirror doesn’t need to be as large and wide as the one on your dressing table. A mirror where a chest-up view can be seen from a little distance will be enough for conducting the work. Moreover, your focus will be on a concentrated area.

Towel– Keep a small towel with you, and keep drying your hands. Otherwise, colors will mix up, and your portrait will be a disaster.

Pot of Clean Water– Whenever you change color, dip your brush into water and clean it. Otherwise, a compound color will be generated by mixing both colors.

Lighting– To get the contrast right, perfect lighting is critical. Hold your light a little above your face and just on one side of your face.

Start Painting!

-First, fix the different positions of the main parts like eyes, nose, and lips, and then make an outline of the face. Do this using a pencil so that if a mistake happens in your work, you can erase and redraw it. Alignment and positioning are vital. Divide your face area into some portions and work with one portion at a time because you cannot sit at a stretch.

– Mark your mirror with tape or markers, so you don’t lose your position even after taking a break.

– Before painting, you can make a sketch first to compare with your painting if you’re going in the right direction. This sketch need not be very detailed. This is just for matching the positioning. Otherwise, you can use a picture too with the same expression and posture.

– You know best which expression defines you most. Hold onto that expression.

– If you want to wear makeup, it would be a recommendation not to put on the foundation. It makes it tough to understand the skin tone.

– Keep the detailing for the last step, but don’t detail everything; try two or three major parts only. When you add detail to everything, it is easy to catch the flaws, but when you detail only the major parts, it keeps the viewer’s focus only on those and hides the flaws. 

– Hair is the magic that can make everything look beautiful. I think you’ll agree with me too. Pay attention to the hairline when you’re done with the outline. Start from the base which is the head and go along with the length. After filling the thick lines, put on details and highlights along with it.

Does it still seem a little bit complicated? Don’t worry. You’ll find it easy once you start painting the self-portrait following these steps. Best of luck with your self-portrait!

This article is part of the HOGDigest editorial series.
Originally written by [Danial Z] and republished with permission.

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