When you can't decide on Level 1 or Level 2. I thought it might be fun to try it on gray paper. Everyone's work is inspiring! Happy to be learning with you all!

Here is my 5th or 6th attempt at the simplified portrait. Lost count lol. This was a very difficult task. It’s amazing how easy it is to mess up proportions and the general feel of a portrait using straight lines, sharp edges, and 5 values.

I feel like my block in turned into mush in the face.

First go at the pear - definitely looking for critiques and feedback. Had some trouble keeping my values consistent here for sure.

Hi! Here's my take on the pear. Limiting myself to only 5 values and not smudging everything to hell was tough :D Also it's quite hard to find separation of values in the light family, was challenging. Will try the portrait tomorrow.

Hi All! Here's my attempt at the pear, working on the portrait...

Thanks Proko, this was great, I wanna try them all. Instead of a razor blade I use a skinny box cutter. It holds a long skinny blade with grooves. When it gets dull you just snap off a piece with a pair of pliers and you've got a new sharp blade. You can do that for a long time before you get to the end and have to put a new blade in. Plus the wheel loosens or tightens the blade so you can safely move the blade back into yellow the casing when you are not using it. I also tape the blades before trashing them. Hope this helps, happy drawing!

DIY sandpaper sharpening pad for travel: I cut a heavy cardboard backing from a legal pad slightly larger than my sheets of sandpaper. Stacked five sheets of 4.25 x 5.5” sandpaper and stapled them together—then stapled the stack to the cardboard. Added a strip of foam padding to protect from staple ends as they were rough then duck taped the top edge of pad. This added a nice grip for holding the pad when sharpening. To prevent charcoal dust from dirtying my travel art pack I enclosed the dirty sheet with the yellow paper and slipped the block into a plastic bag. Voila! Thanks for the DIY prompt Stan!

2023/1/1. Good evening everybody. Here's my assignment for the first part of @Stephen Bauman's Classical Portraiture course. Thanks for any comment or suggestion that could help me to improve it.

Help

James Gurney/Cesar Santos, they both make my jaw drop and share their knowledge in a way that makes it clear, understandable and fun. I'd love to meet either one.

Wowza Proko, this has been a blast, thanks so much for all the new things to learn!

Thank you Cornelia, beautiful painting!

I'm up to mannequinization in Figure Drawing, so far I am having fun and making progress. I so admire Proko's line work, but haven't quite mastered it yet and am still working on that.

I struggled with the proportions, but gave it a try. The camera crunched the subtleties, but I hope you can get the idea.