James Wilson Portrait

[agent-era.livejournal.com]

I can post fan art here right? He does have a rather woeful look on his face....



Ok, please give me your honest opinions on this. I used a S.1 promo pic for a ref. Does he look like Wilson?


Wilson didn't move from his position on the floor. He stared unseeingly at the closed door of his office. His cheek stung. House's angry words still ringing in his ears. They'd hurt more than the fist. Silent tears started to fall and Wilson didn't stop them....


I'd love it if anyone would turn that into a full fledged gen fic. My inspiration for that was: what if after the episode "Detox" House found out that it was Wilson who was the mastermind behind the bet? Naturally, he gets mad....and violent...

Comments

[yarroway.livejournal.com]

Wow, that's a great picture!

You can post pretty much whatever you want here, so long as it's sick Wilsony. The snippet of story with the pic pushes it into our territory.

[agent-era.livejournal.com]

Great! So glad that you like it :)

[romanse1.livejournal.com]

I like this portrait. It's pleasing to my eye. If u really want to know if I think it looks like Wilson then I'd have to say, no, not to me. This man looks much younger than the Wilson I know so that may be a factor. I don't think so though. Wilson has distinctive eyes that I'd like to think I'd recognize. Shrugs ...exact likenesses r not the end all and be all of art. You drew something nice looking and it can only get even better from there.

[agent-era.livejournal.com]

Thanks much for the honesty! Portraits are something I really struggle with, especially capturing the exact likeness. But yeah, he does look like a much younger Wilson. Maybe when he was in med school?

[romanse1.livejournal.com]

You are so welcome! As an artist, I know what how tricky it can be to post art and sincerely ask for feedback. Either most people don't want to, or don't know what to say, or the feedback is of questionable value. Personally, I'd love to see the photo reference you used.

I have learned many things from other artists as well as discovered a few things for myself. I am happy to share the one technique I know will make a HUGE difference in capturing likenesses more accurately, if being able to improve on likeness is your goal.

[agent-era.livejournal.com]

Here's the ref:

http://images.sodahead.com/polls/000198204/polls_robert_sl_2453_646496_answer_4_xlarge.jpeg

[romanse1.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much for sharing that photo ref!

Ok, so after I saw it, I cropped it as well as your portrait, then placed them side by side for a visual analysis. The conclusion is that there are TWO different analyses and they depend on what your original goal was. I’ll call them an A and a B analysis. Now, there are many places where the feature placement is incorrect on the drawing when compared to the photo ref. This is the A analysis. . The result is that the end product differs substantially from the photo reference. That is not necessarily a bad thing because you as an artist may not have had in mind that you wanted to actually reproduce the photo reference as a drawing. That is perfectly acceptable – you are not obliged to conform to the photo reference in order to produce a drawing that is recognizably like the character – HOWEVER;, if you want to produce a drawing that has a solid likeness to the character, then your drawing must demonstrate that you have a solid understanding of the actor’s facial features. This is the B analysis.

You can do what I did and place the cropped photo ref alongside the cropped drawing and do your own visual A analysis.

B analysis (where you are going for character likeness, but not necessarily photo ref conformity), is a bit trickier. Here are just some things I see: The major place where the wheels fell off the wagon is the nose. This is not the actor’s nose. The nose you drew is straight and narrow. Wilson’s nose is curved. It protrudes out, with a wide little “elf-like” bulb at the end. Second, the distance between his upper lip and nose, and bottom lip and chin are slightly off. This is small, but this small thing changes the shape of his face. Lastly, the distance between the upper eye and eyebrow is off. The actor’s eyes are more deep-set. Without that depth placement, his eyes, while attractive in your drawing, are not Wilson’s eyes as much as they need to be.

The drawing technique that I would recommend will absolutely cure the difficulties with correct feature placement, thus leaving you free to either complete a drawing that closely resembles the photo ref, or frees you to take creative liberties and STILL create a character who is recognizable.

[agent-era.livejournal.com]

Wow...very detailed and thoughtful analysis...thanks. You gave a lot of useful pointers that I shall keep in mind whenever I draw dear ol' Jimmy again :)

Interested in expanding on the drabble?

[blackmare.livejournal.com]

I like the feel of your lines, and as someone who traditionally had a ton of trouble drawing people (and now I'm a pro artist for a living), I'll suggest trying out drawing with a grid, as shown here: http://www.art-made-easy.com/drawing-using-a-grid.html

I use this tool whenever I have accurate portraits to do; mine are usually animal portraits, but you can do anything this way. Using the grid will reveal to you just how much your brain fools your eye. What I mean is, you'll discover that a lot of proportions are very, very different than you think they are. Every time I grid something out, I end up saying to myself, "No, that line can't be that short (or long, or whatever)!" but yes. Yes, it is. And getting used to looking at where the edges of shapes intersect the lines on the grid, will help train your eye to see shapes in relationship to each other.

About the prompt, House did find out, in canon, and confront Wilson about what he'd done. He was hurt and angry, yes, but he left Wilson's office and just let Wilson stew in his guilt. House didn't even punch Wilson after "Finding Judas," later on, so ... it might take some doing for me to get that to happen and feel in character. I'll think about it.

[agent-era.livejournal.com]

Thanks!

I'll have to try using the grid again. I've used them before but I've little patience for them. In my current art class however, we've been using the grid system a lot so it's getting a little easier. Which season is "Finding Judas" in? (isn't there an episode where Wilson does get punched? I've seen pics with Wilson having a bloody nose).

Thanks for taking a look at it at least.

[blackmare.livejournal.com]

I had a whole lengthy reply and then LJ wouldn't let me post it or even copy the text to paste in here. That's the third long reply I've lost tonight; I'm giving up until tomorrow! But I can tell you that the scene where House punches Wilson doesn't actually happen. House dreams it. The thought is in his mind, then, but on the show he never does it.

But now you've given me a challenge, so I'll keep it simmering. I may not be able to convince myself House would punch Wilson over the Detox thing, but I am sure I could think of some kind of scenario where he would.