A person...why not?

Painting Number Two. Eager to become a famous painter I decided to try my hand at a figure. I had this lovely photo of my daughter on the beach:

Great light and nice lines.

So first I roughed in the figure:

Measurement was really important here and getting her arm over her head at just the right angle proved challenging. Just starting to figure out the lights and darks.

Here I add more light and dark:

 and you can see how distorted this is. Her face is looking the wrong way, her midsection is huge and that arm is placed wrong...

carving her out a bit:

I think it gets a bit better here, but the arms are way too big and her upper body is huge. Measure, measure.

I've toned down her thighs a bit here...probably started working on the water out of frustration!

 Starting to work a lot with shadows and light...again, she's not "skin color", but a blend of so many colors (I'm just grasping this concept).

This is toward the end of the painting, I've added in a lot of light and her reflections on the water (which I like). Midsection still too big and I'm not crazy about the transition between shadow and light on her body.

Here's what I finished with:

It's really not one that I am gonna grab and show my friends! The sky is wacked. Her upper body is way too big and her face is still not facing as it should. The ocean is not doing much for me either. I like her legs and the reflection on the water...that's about it :)