- Hardcover: 128 pages
- Publisher: North Light Books; 1st. Ed edition (Nov 1997)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0891346414
- ISBN-13: 978-0891346418
- Product Dimensions: 28.4 x 22.4 x 1.5 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 534,321 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- See Complete Table of Contents
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More About the Author
Product Description
Product Description
Popular artist Al Stine shares his secrets and techniques for creating portraits alive with emotion, expression and color.
The well-painted portrait tells a story, reveals a personality, evokes emotion. And nobody's portraits do it better than A1 Stine's. In this book, he shows artists how to paint fresh and colorful watercolor portraits that are as unique and alive as the subjects themselves.
-- step-by-step demonstrations cover every aspect of portraiture -- from drawing lifelike facial features to creating drama with light and shadow
-- an entire chapter is devoted to the challenging (but vital) subject of mixing beautiful skin tones
-- Stine reveals his personal, proven methods and materials
-- concludes with a series of complete portrait painting projects
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
14 of 14 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Al's approach is clear and simple. He shows you how to compose portraits that make the subject a balanced and organic part of the picture. He sections on lighting and colour mixing are excellent. His step by step projects encourage you to have a go. This book inspired me to stop practicing and start painting. If you are interested in painting people you must buy this book.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
This book starts with some portrait basics - materials, colours, body parts - before proceeding to twelve fairly-detailed step-by-step demonstrations of portraits in watercolour. Most of Stine's portraits are basically vignettes - he usually adds some indistinct shapes that link the person to the four edges of the paper in a 'cruciform' composition, but leaves the corners blank. The demos are useful, but inevitably each stage involves quite a lot of work that is described in only a few sentences. That's a general problem with the technique, not particular to this book, and perhaps it's a good thing as it forces you to think rather than just copy. This is definitely one of the best books on a subject for which there is little teaching available.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
6 reviews
29 of 29 people found the following review helpful
The only book you will need on painting watercolor portraits
22 Jun 2001
Format:Hardcover
Indeed, this is the ONLY book I decided to have a copy of my own on painting watercolor portraits. I purchased this book several years ago, read it, applied it, and found it a real gem. Although my current interest is mostly painting in oil, I still remember vividly my pleasant experiences using the book:
- The author thoroughly presents the topics in the book, from improving your drawing skills, lighting models, to using colors, etc...
- His style is what that is referred as "painterly". The finished paintings are enlightening, artistic, and simply beautiful. I love and treasure the works created by this author, as well as those representing great craftmanship and expressions.
Buy this book if you still can find a copy of it. To fully benefit it, may I suggest:
- First and foremost, focus on your drawing skills. With a tranparent medium like watercolor, drawing skills are more than ever the most crucial requirement for a great final painting.
- Practice, practice, and practice, using advices from the book.
Thank you, Mr. Stine, for a great book!
17 of 17 people found the following review helpful
Get Your Portraits Freer and Looser
23 Jan 2001
Format:Hardcover
I don't really use the how-to portions of books like these although I'm sure many artists do. What I like doing instead is looking at the pictures and see what they in and of themselves can teach me. What struck me about this book when I bought it was that if one wanted to make one's portraits a lot freer, more fluid, flowing and looser, this book shows that very well. I would especially encourage any of us working in colored pencils or pastels to consider incorporating watercolor in a mixed media approach towards portraiture. Stine definitely shows more Impressionistic results in portraiture than realistic. However, these are hardly Abstract Expressionist portraits! You can't mix this with oil, of course, so if you are looking at this work compared to your own in oil, you would be contemplating doing a complete 180 degree switch. It certainly would save you an enormous amount of drying time to make the switch from oil to watercolor. The brush work seems as if it would be a lot faster as well. Every page in this book seems to have a full color watercolor portrait featured on it so it is a good value for the money as well.
25 of 27 people found the following review helpful
This may be the best water color portrait book available
29 Jun 1998
Format:Hardcover
This book is focusing on contour drawing and the use of water colors for portrait painting. As a matter of fact water colors are mostly used for natur painting and this may be the reason for the very few portrait books avaialble.
The author gives av very good instruction in what colors to use to develope various skin tones and how to paint shapes due to shadows and edges in the motive. This book has in many ways completed my large collection of book about water color painting.
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