A commission I did for *marron.

The commission description was simple: to depict Paul McCartney melacholy or nostalgic, and if possible, have him holding his Hofner bass guitar. She provided tons of references for me, but I ended up coming back to and clinging to one reference of him in particular.

I ended up making three working drafts, each with a different idea and setting. Finally, I drafted this out, changed it at least three more times, and stuck with this concept.

It was difficult for me to "feel" this piece in the beginning. And not only because it's supposed to be a living person that is easily recognizable, but the idea is a little out of my element. This is also the first time in many years that I've ever done a "full body" painting.

While I was doing this, I didn't listen to "Blackbird" or "Yesterday" or "Hey Jude" fifty billion times over and over again to get into the mood. I actually listened to Muse's "Origin of Symmetry" and "Absolution" albums to get myself into that melancholy yet haunting mode of rendering that I enjoy.

Color palette and color balancing done in Photoshop, but the painting and modeling was all done in Painter, as usual. I've started using another "brush" other than detail oil and soft oil pastel--vine charcoal.

It's time like these that I'm really annoyed with the fact that I have down the resolution size for public viewing...because I'm rather fond of the way texturing on his face, in particular, came out with the working 300 dpi resolution.

This was extremely challenging for me. While it's not at all perfect in any sense, I did enjoy doing this after all. It was great practice, and I learned a great deal.