The New Year work begins – Two portraits

You may remember these two photos in my New Year post.  They are of my friends when young!  At the time, they didn’t know each other and even if they had, I don’t think they would have thought of a painted portrait.   However shortly after, they met and married, and are still joyfully and happily married.

So my idea was to paint a joint portrait to celebrate that splendid day (and all the intervening years) by putting the two together.  There are some concerns – the photos are not the same scale, and I needed to find a way of stitching the two photos together.  I have chosen a conventional pose.  As they are both facing the same way it seemed the best answer, and he really is taller than her even allowing for the bouffant hairdo!

I then marked a vertical line for the centre of each face about 10 inches long and drew the outline of the head and shoulders, so as to equalise the scale, in using sepia paint and a small thin brush.  A quick scrub of dilute paint marked in the main shadows – I’m using the lighting on her photo as his is pretty washed out – and I think I have made a good start .

Double portrait
Double portrait

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