Practice painting/ commission work and what I took away from them

I started a Fiverr account (https://uk.fiverr.com/kamilot) during summer in the hope that it could help me with my university work, as I wanted to get more practice with being given a brief and following it, doing work for someone else. I managed to get a few things on it, but not enough character design/ portrait work yet. 

My first portrait order was from a guy that wanted a Boondocks style image. Below you can see an image from the show.

I was provided this image on the left, which is seemingly a sketch in the style of the show, and I produced a copy, to the best of my ability, on the right.

I was provided with pictures of the guy who wanted me to draw him in the style of the cartoon. This was my first attempt, I wanted to see if he was happy before I took it any further. However, it fell through and I didn't get to do the job. Ultimately Fiverr gives me the opportunity to apply for jobs, or be given a job, that require a specific styles or a specific request. I get to practice different styles as well as my own, this really helped me keep up with my art, and gave me more of an incentive as well. Sometimes I struggle to get inspiration and direct my own art, so this was a great way of getting me started. 

Below is another request I had just before the first week of uni, which was just to draw a picture of the buyer that I was provided with. This is something I would never naturally attempt, as I hate drawing feathers and rarely draw faces in such expressive facial expressions. However, this gave me a lot of good practice with trying to paint fairly quicker than I would usually. It was also good practice in painting bare skin, which I don't usually do either. I am generally pleased with this, however, I think it needs more time on the headdress, and a few details picked out on the face. 

The reason I included these in this blog is that they represent practice, as well as me trying out new styles as well as trying to figure out my own. The above painting, I just went straight in and tried to paint it so that it looked like the picture I was given. However, I wish I put more thought into how I could paint it so that it wasn't just a realistic painting, a way to incorporate more of my style. In some ways, I do see bits of my style creeping through, like the somewhat rough blending of colour to separate the painting from a photo-realistic one. 

Furthermore, both these images convey a sense of character, even if it is just a small amount. In both, the emphasis is in the face, this is an area I forget about when I draw full body characters. So this is the lesson I take away, that the face is an area of great importance alongside the pose and clothing to covey a sense of self. I feel that a great sense of the character is shown in the pose and the facial expression, more so than the clothes. I would like to explore this further, doing some initial character designs focusing on the posture and expressions of the characters, to see if my theory is correct.