painting the queen

this is the third [and final] of my portaits based on characters from alice’s adventures in wonderland.

i give you, The Royal Portrait

this portrait was inspired completely by the work of alexa meade, whose work i discovered recently [and shared on my other blog here.]

im struggling to decide how successful this has been.. when you work so long on trying to create an illusion, it is difficult to see it with fresh eyes. does the illusion work?? 

when i tell you that this painting is a photgraph of a live model [my lovely friend, courtney brady], who has been painted – are you surprised? did you immediately spot the trick, did you know something wasn’t quite right, or did the illusion work? please comment – if only to let me know! lol.

my suspicion [or hope] is that you thought something was odd, but didn’t immediately clock what astray.  the eyes are certainly a give away with such a close headshot – but i think the hair betrays this more than anything else. i had intended to paint the background more, inorder to break up the outline, but what with changing light, messing with the tripod, and still getting to grips with the camera – it just went right out of my head.

next time – and i really do want to try this again – i wont forget to do that. with these illusions, it is all about getting the finishing touches just right. 

so that’s all of my alice portraits. i had so many more ideas than i possibly had time to do. these three photographs were for a university project that is now handed in, so it’d be hard to feel motivated to add to this collection. but then, there are so many other themes and character re-interpretations that hold such potential that i feel it’d be criminal not carry on working on this illusion through the lens idea in some capactity.  watch this space :]

actually, i’d been wanting to learn more about photography for ages, but never made the time or had enough motivation. so working on this project over the last few weeks has been a fantastic learning experience,  giving me my first ever decent interaction with an SLR [nikon D80]. sadly the camera is not mine, but i dont see how i can possibly go back to using a compact after this! reflecting, the scary thing is that every good photo i took only made me realise just how much i have to learn about photography. this is very much fledgling territory.

anyway, i reckon that’s me hooked on photography now – this is easily going to be the most expensive hobby i have ever had in my life!

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