Janae Lehto Fine Art

Lavada and Ken, charcoal, 11″x14″

I feel like I’ve neglected this, but I guess not…it’s only been 5 days or so. I think I’m getting to the final stretch with the most recent portrait, though I’m still not calling it done. It has a different feel to it than the others, but I think it has more to do with the following:

1. the source photo: the source photo was not as clear as the others, so there is less detail. Less detail in the photo=less detail in the portrait.
2. vicinity to the camera: this comes back to the # of subjects for obvious reasons.
3. # of subjects: the more people in the portrait, the less focus I can provide to each. Basically, this is the key to the whole portrait – the more subjects, the further they have to be from the camera, and the less detail it will provide.

So, really it comes down to you get what you give me. As a customer, it’s up to you to tell me what you want. You are paying for a portrait and I want it to be the best that it can possibly be. That means when I ask you to give me criticism (ie, does it look like you/him/her? What about the nose that doesn’t look right?). I’m perfectly fine with straying from the photo, since photographs are known to lie.