Calla Lilies

When working with lilies I also began drawing reference form a black and white photo to focus on value first. Once I finished painting, I realised that the flower was way darker than in the photo. It made a foreground for a layer of coloured pencils which lighten up desired parts:

At the end of painting I still had some acrylic leftovers and decided to start doing quick 15 min self portraits in A4 to use up the paint.

It was real fun to be less focused and more playful. I didn't plan for facial features to be in correct places and realised that without it I struggle to maintain proportions. I added soft pastels to finish it off. Because of it I decided to continue with this practice and hopefully improve over time, or maybe put more effort into learning how to paint faces 'properly'.

I had one more go with the same lily and made the flower much brighter with acrylics, adding less contrasting (than in the previous flower) pencils.

Can't really decide if it's better to be more accurate with value when using paint and add just a bit of touch up with pencils, or be more random with paint and bring everything together with coloured pencils. It might vary from flower to flower, so I will just experiment and have more than one take with each kind of flower.

Quick self portrait:

This time I used coloured pencils with acrylics. It felt good to just play and made me want to be more intentful with facial layout next time.

Another lily, another self portrait:

Looking like a different person each time!

Lilies together on A2: