Portraiture (Exploring Different Mediums, Styles & Techniques)

"Art nouveau portraits" AI-generated

I tried out MidJourney, an AI-generative art tool, and created this series of art nouveau portraits. It's amazing what artificial intelligence can do!

See more of my artwork inspired by art nouveau.

"Arlo Taylor" Quick charcoal portrait

This is a portrait of my eldest son, Arlo Taylor in charcoal pencil on art paper.

"Sylvie Taylor" Quick charcoal portrait

This is a portrait of my daughter, Sylvie Taylor in charcoal pencil on art paper.

"2 female charcoal portraits" Charcoal pencil on grey paper

Two separate portraits of the same model. I drew these on grey paper with charcoal pencil, plus white charcoal for the highlights.

"Summer and the Duke" Watercolor portrait

This is a portrait of my youngest son, Summer, riding his Mum's dog, 'The Duke'.

I worked from a few reference photos because it's impossible for kids and dogs to stay still!

"Kevin Taylor in charcoal" Portrait of my Dad

This is a portrait of my Dad, Kevin Taylor. He was also an artist.

"Basic female portrait" Charcaol pencil on art paper

This was a short pose so I didn't get far with the drawing, but I love how you can see all the construction lines.

It's nice to see how a drawing is structured and built up by an artist because you can learn so much.

"Art nouveau portrait" Graphite pencil drawing

I worked on this drawing in my spare time and it took a while to get it this far. I enjoy working in art nouveau style but each line of hair can take a while to get right, it's worth all the effort though.

I originally intended to ink this afterward but I actually quite like the messy pencil look.

If you look at the larger version you can see a few smudges, marks and construction lines etc. that's all part of it.

"James Bamford" Charcoal on orange paper

A portrait of my friend, James Bamford, with charcoal on orange paper.

"Man with white beard" Graphite pencil portrait

This portrait was really hard to draw because the model's large white beard was concealing his jaw line. When you can't see the shape and extent of someone's face then it's hard to map out all the anatomical features accurately.

But I guess its good practice to draw poses like this because it helps you to visualise the important anatomical landmarks underneath hair and clothes. We don't always have the luxury of drawing naked, hairless people!

I drew this picture with a grade H graphite pencil and it was so light on the page that it was very hard to see. After I scanned in the sketch I increased the contrast in Photoshop so you could see more detail in the linework, as a result the tooth on the paper is more apparant too.

"Softly drawn girl portrait" Charcoal on art paper

I love this portrait. It's actually a section of one of my charcoal life drawings.

"Nice female portrait" Charcoal on tan paper

This is a nice portrait study.

I sat very close to the model so I was able to see a lot more detail then normal. It really makes a difference when you can see what you are trying to draw.

If you look closely you can see horizontal lines evenly spaced across the page, this was a pattern in the paper itself. I prefer not to use paper with lines such as this because it can ruin a picture, however I had no choice this time because I left my good paper at home and had to borrow some.

"Portrait with curls" Charcoal pencil on art paper

This is a nice simple portrait but I think it would have looked much better on toned paper.

"Girl with black hair" Red, black, & white chalk portrait on blue paper

This is my first attempt at drawing with red, black and white chalk on blue paper. I think it's going to take a bit of practice. I went a bit heavy on the black and it seems to have ruined the subtlety.

See more of my chalk life drawings.

"Old man portrait" Red chalk portrait on blue paper

A portrait study trying out new mediums, red crayon on blue paper.

"Male portrait" Charcoal rendered drawing

In this male portrait study I used white in a more subtle way and I think it works.

For a while I was using strong white on toned paper and using the paper color as the shadow areas, but now I've found that it's much better to put in the shadows with blocks of tone and save the white for just the highlights.

It gives a much more refined look.

"Asian girl portrait" Tonal charcoal drawing

Neutral grey with black and white charcoal is such a good combination of mediums to work with.

"Sai with messy hair" Watercolor & black ink portrait

This is a painting of my friend Sai. She has very curly hair that's always a bit messy. She tries to straighten it but I think it looks a lot better when it's all crazy and untamed.

I love her hair in this image. In fact I think it really makes the painting work. Straight hair would not have the same impact.

Sai is also an amazing artist, follow her on Instagram.

"Female portrait" Charcoal pencil sketch

A simple portrait of a girl done while studying facial features.

This would have looked much more interesting if it was drawn on toned paper with black and white charcoal.

"Subdued Crystal" Watercolour and ink illustration in muted colors

I painted this watercolor picture of Crystal to use as part of the design for a new version of this website but I didn't use it after all. I was inspired by the beautiful watercolor art by Arthur Rackham and his subdued colour schemes.

"Angela reading" Charcoal tonal portrait study

This is a friend of mine reading a book drawn from life.

I feel like there are two focal points in the drawing, her face, and her hands holding her book. Perhaps it would have been better if I focused on just one?

"Teu Dream" Watercolor portrait

Teu Dream (pronounced 'to dream') is a character I was developing . My plan was to use her in short comics illustrating the many weird dreams I have.

"Crystal Glow" Color Vector Illustration

This is one of my smallest Flash pictures ever! Only 3k =) It's a picture of Crystal that I used for the front page of my website a number of versions ago.

See more of my vector art.

"Crystal the doll" Vector Portrait Illustration

Crystal the Doll is one of my favourite characters.

"Björk Venus" Vector Illustration

I redrew the cover art from Björk's single Venus as a Boy so I could change the colour scheme to pink rather than turquoise. This drawing was originally used in Flash for an older version of my Björk website.

There was such a lot of detail, I drew every single stitch in her jumper!

"Lyndal the Flower Girl" CorelDraw Portrait

This is Lyndal the flower girl - part human and part plant. Her hair turns into flowers!

I first drew this picture in pencil then inked it with black felt tip pen. Next I scanned it in black and white and turned it into a vector drawing with CorelTrace.

All the colors were added in CorelDraw.

"Crystal circle" Color Vector Illustration

This was my first portrait drawing of Crystal the Doll, it has something nice about it.

“I've been creating art all my life and running this website since 1997! During this time I've found many amazing tools and services that I cannot live without.”
— Matthew James Taylor

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