How to Sculpt a Portrait in 10 Steps

I'm your instructor for this portrait sculpting course Andrew joso Keith and in this video we're going to be going over the assignment that you've all been waiting for a self-portrait sculpture let's get into it [Music] so far in the course we've gone over the structure of the skull and sculpted a simple and complex version we've looked at the planes of the head and a simplified head with just the secondary forms we've practiced some of the individual features of the face the eyes ears nose mouth and in this video we're going to put that all together with our first full portrait sculpting assignment we're going to sculpt you well we're not going to sculpt you you're going to sculpt you yourself a self-portrait a selfie sculpt in this lesson I'm going to quickly go over my 10 steps to a successful portrait sculpture as an overview and in the coming lessons we'll go over each step in detail some of these will be premium and premium demos to help you solidify the information so that by the end you'll know exactly what to do during each step of the sculpting process step one collecting references whether you're doing a selfie portrait or sculpting a friend or family member or even a celebrity it's important to gather as much visual information as possible the more photo or video references that we have the more angles we're able to observe the less information that we have to make up while making up some information may be necessary it's much easier to do once we have lots of experience and we've sculpted the features many many times in the beginning it's important to lean heavily on the references to inform each aspect of the sculpture for this selfie sculpt I recommend a simple straightforward pose with your face muscles relaxed and your eyes looking ahead even if you're able to be sculpting somebody from life you still might want to take some references because those photos will help you flatten the image and really focus on the outline step two building an Armature once we've got the references and the pose for the portrait we can build out the Armature well keep in mind the size of the portrait and the type of clay that we're using to sculpt I typically like to use a baseboard a floor flange and a pipe as a simple Armature and then add the wireframe that can be filled with wrinkled paper I'll go more in depth on armatures in a future video once we've got our Armature it's time for the next step step 3 building out the Block in the Block in provides a thin simplified version of the head that serves as a foundation to build the features on top of we've already gone over the Loomis method the Bridgeman method and the Bodum method for building out block ends in previous lessons if you haven't watched those videos and done those assignments then shame on you no just kidding but it will help for this third step step 4 capturing the likeness of the silhouette of the profile this is where the rubber meets the road or where the clay meets the face capturing the likeness of a specific person is much easier when we already have the silhouette established that is the likeness from the side view we want to take our time to build out the silhouette from the center line and make sure that it's accurate as possible because we'll use this as a reference for other features like the depth of the eye socket or the cheekbones step 5 adding the Bony structures the features we went over when sculpting the skull there's a reason that one of the first things that we went over in the course was sculpting the skull it's important to have these features in your mind and be able to lay them out in a simple way during this stage of the process you can use a tool to draw in the features before adding the clay because drawing on the surface of the block-in is much quicker than adding and removing pieces of clay once the guidelines are accurate then you can build out the features in clay things like the cheekbones the eye sockets and other bony features can be added once we have an accurate silhouette in place these forms can be built out from the surface using lines of clay or you can be more specific with the shape of the Bony structures step 6 capturing the likeness from the front view now we can start to take the portrait head on and face it it's time to capture the shape of the face from the front view and fill in the mass of the areas in between the high points step 7 checking the portrait this step can and should be done throughout the process but I wanted to make it have its own step so that we don't forget how vital it is there are many methods for checking your portrait sculpture and I'll go over those in more detail in the lesson on this step but for now here are just a few ways that you can check yourself you can check the sculpture from above or below to look for any asymmetry look at the sculpture using a mirror step back away from your sculpture use an app or photoshop to Overlay images of the sculpture and the references you can use calipers to take measurements you can change the lighting and the list goes on check yourself often using different methods and don't be afraid to get another person's perspective even just taking images of the sculpture and looking at it on a 2d screen can help you see the sculpture in a new way step 8 working around the sculpture from every angle like I've mentioned before many times it's important to focus on the outline of the sculpture more than on the internal information inside the outline it's a common mistake in sculpting to look at the portrait from the front view and then just try to capture the likeness just from that angle but it's much more difficult than if you just capture the silhouette from one angle move slightly capture it from another angle and work around the sculpture that way so that you're not missing any areas remember the silhouette from one angle is the internal information from another angle step 9 finalizing the secondary forms and working on the details here we're almost at the last stage of the sculpture and you notice that I haven't mentioned anything like scope the nose or sculpt the eyes or sculpt the ears that's because you should be developing those features as you're checking yourself and as you're working throughout the process most of the mistakes that beginners make are in the primary and secondary forms when sculpting things like the eye for example you can do what you did with the profile by giving an outline of the eye from the side view and then filling in the area around that High Point even though we're coming to the end of the process don't be afraid to make big changes if they're required I'd say that the last steps of the process are the most difficult and take the most time because it's all about making really small adjustments and just getting it closer and closer to the reference once you've gone all of those secondary forms in place and the details of the eyes nose ears are established then you can start thinking about what do you want the final texture to be step 10 texturing the 10th and final step is deciding what type of texture you want on your sculpture and making that texture consistent throughout the sculpture okay that's a lot of stuff to think about but don't get too overwhelmed just take this assignment one step at a time you might be surprised how much of a difference it makes by simply focusing on each of these steps in order and finishing the step before you move on to the next one while these steps will make sculpting a portrait easier to tackle and more structured there is no substitute for consistent practice once you have more experience sculpting these steps May mix together and become more blurred you may modify the steps to fit your own workflow and that's a good thing some steps may be done simultaneously or you may need to come back and redo some previous steps before you move on that's totally fine I look forward to seeing your submissions for this assignment if you'd like you can include some references of yourself that you used for this self-portrait you can use the hashtag selfiesculpt to share this assignment on social media be sure to get the full course if you want all the helpful premium content where we expand on what we've gone over in these free videos I hope to see you over there at the premium course if you like this video subscribe to the channel we have tons of helpful content for people interested in 3D sculpture as always stay creative stay productive active and I'll see in the next one

Channel: Proko 3D

Views: 27,998

Keywords: how to sculpt, sculpture, portrait sculpt, anatomy for artists, andrew joseph keith, artist, artistic anatomy, anatomy, sculpt people, art, tutorial, sculpting tutorial, learn to sculpt, art school, art class, human anatomy, art training, art blog, art vlog, drawing lesson, art lesson, learning art

Id: XP2s6aLaSx8

Length: 9min 18sec (558 seconds)

Published: Wed May 03 2023