"Boy": Process

I posted these step-by-step photos of the progress of one of my favorite paintings earlier on a different blog that, unfortunately, is no longer with us. But, by popular demand, I've decided to re-post the photos here so that you can get a general sense of how I prefer to approach portrait paintings. Each painting is unique both in style and process so I can't say this is indicative of how I do all my work but there are touchstones: the drawing, blocking in darkest shapes, filling in basic values with a minimal palette and a large brush, then working my way down to the smaller strokes, value shifts, and heightening color in key areas.