Self Portrait Feedback

I finally got some feedback on my self portrait. I was quite curious as to how my instructor was going critique this one because up until this point he had reference photos to fall back on. He could directly specify certain features that were off, or just drawn completely wrong because he knew exactly what we were duplicating. With this one, we drew them live, and therefore he didn't have any reference. On top of this, unless we've uploaded a student profile picture, and he's taken the time to check it out (highly doubtful), he has no real idea what I look like beyond my own representation here. So needless to say, I was pretty curious how he was going to tackle this one from a marking standpoint. I should have guess though, seeing as this is an anatomy class, and he's an expert in anatomy, that he would focus solely on that. He can tell when something is off, or needs more definition, simply through his understanding of the forms. And this is what he did, commented on what looked of, and doesn't make sense anatomically. This has got to be one of my favorite instructor critiques for this reason. It has taught me that we don't need to rely on the reference if we have an in depth understanding of the forms. That is where I aspire to be someday.

The face is very good here Dan. It has a bit of a Deco look to it. The hair needs work if only to fine tune the skull a bit. The neck needs some work as well. The face is the strong part. I would look at the upper lip to be darker if the light is coming from from above. Look for specifics of the forms of the features. For this I would recommend further reading into Stephen Pecks anatomy book that gives such a great education about the forms of each. The ear on yours is very good which is rare. Get the Peck book. You deserve the information as you have real ability here and should push it. X is the wide point of the head and the line from the back of the jaw is the wide part in general.The values are quite good. The lips are too pale and the upper is most likely deeper . You can make the lashes a soft tone I would look for a few highlights as they will give you an indication as to the tone of the flesh around it. The red and full part of the lips do not come all the way to the corners of the mouth. I would look for the area immediately above the eyebrows to be thicker. There is an area where a sweat band is worn that is thiner. There is a sort of bump at Z which is the frontal eminence

Grade: A-