Painting

One of the questions I am always asked is how do you paint?  Do you work from a photograph?

Well the truth is, it depends.

I am happy to work direct from the subject standing outside with my easel. Last year 60 % of my paintings were done like that.

I am happy to work from a sketch.

I also work from photographs but here is the thing.  I use them as an aid. I use them to provide information as a "reference" The finished painting will not be a duplicate of the photograph, it will not have the same colours but it will be used to provide information on the shapes and proportions of the subject. I am quite often commissioned to work from a photograph or a series of photographs. 

The difficulty in all these methods arises in the amount of detail available to work from.

Artists work in different ways to produce their work and they are all equally valid in my opinion.