@larikontula's post on Artfol
Likeness in art. What's your experience? Any tips?
Likeness means different things to different people and we never know if someone's insecure about any facial feature.
I still remember my psychology teacher just saying one day that she's insecure about how big her nose is and I never thought that. I was so surprised.
Our relationship to how we look, or are viewed, or even how we THINK we MIGHT be viewed, is so complicated.
When drawing commissions of real people, I do one round of feedback to focus on likeness only. I give alternatives and vary the style I draw in, so we can talk about style. It's not just me stating "this is you". I happily tweak the smallest things, like eyebrows, cause I don't want someone holding the thought of "oh I don't like how he did that." That's not good.
I take direction.
Usually people who ask for art made of themselves are already okay with the idea of it not being a mirror image of them, but a character.May 8, 2021
Likeness means different things to different people and we never know if someone's insecure about any facial feature.
I still remember my psychology teacher just saying one day that she's insecure about how big her nose is and I never thought that. I was so surprised.
Our relationship to how we look, or are viewed, or even how we THINK we MIGHT be viewed, is so complicated.
When drawing commissions of real people, I do one round of feedback to focus on likeness only. I give alternatives and vary the style I draw in, so we can talk about style. It's not just me stating "this is you". I happily tweak the smallest things, like eyebrows, cause I don't want someone holding the thought of "oh I don't like how he did that." That's not good.
I take direction.Usually people who ask for art made of themselves are already okay with the idea of it not being a mirror image of them, but a character.May 8, 2021
#question
#tips
#discussion
#community
#likeness
Comments
My art is already pretty stylized, so I automatically tweak and stylize some things about people when I draw them! I've never had anyone take issue with it yet, they all seem to like it.
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I had this happen with one of my comms as well! My commissioner wanted bigger eyebrows and it surprised me bc I usually do thinner ones as thick eyebrows are sometimes not seen as a thing of beauty but hey, they wanted thick eyebrows I gave them thick eyebrows 
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