I've stressed this before, but it really is imperative to work from life.  Even a 10 second sketch from life will have more magic than a finished painting from a digital photo.  I emphasize this in my classes and I will always tell everyone how important it is.  There's really no way to put it into words.  It's like listening to live music Vs. listening to through other means.  I also feel way more proud of my work when I work from life.

  I've been back and forth about having an Instagram for a long time now.  I used to have a fairly successful commission business on Instagram over this past year and summer.  I always ended up feeling very ambivalent about it all because I love sharing my artwork and doing commissions, but I also feel very insincere about shoving my paintings into people's faces.  I'm more of a private person and I enjoy growing personal connections.  All in all I'll always have this website, I'll always share my artwork and my thoughts, but I may not always have an instagram.  I also have some personal things that I need to figure out about myself and  I can't pretend to be something that I'm not.
  I read an article a while ago about some guy who said how bad it is that people are always on their phones on social media and people don't seem to be able to sit alone with their thoughts nowadays.  And blah, blah, blah about attention spans and whatever.  And then at the end of the article, this author says to make sure to follow him on a bunch of social media sites.  That to me is ironic, hilarious and sad.  So I will never shame anyone on social media, because it's an amazing tool for connecting with friends and sharing your thoughts.  And I really enjoy connecting with my old friends and seeing what they're up to.  But there's nothing like seeing someone in person or bumping into someone by accident whom you haven't seen in years.
  I want to share a final story that relates how I feel about this feeling of connecting with people in real life.  I might have written about this before, but I had a tour of an art school in New York a while ago because I was thinking about doing a masters program there.  While I was on the tour, I saw a painting hanging on a wall and recognized the style of it.  I saw the name labeled by it and realized it was a dear friend of mine who I hadn't seen in years.
 I asked the tour guide if his studio was in the school and she said yes.  We stopped by his studio space, but he wasn't there so I left a note giving my information.  And then someone else said that my long lost friend might be in the basement working on a sculpture.  At this point, I had lost all interest in the tour and I just wanted to see my friend.  We went to the basement, but he wasn't there again.  But then I turned around to leave and there he was!  This, to me, was real life magic and I'll never forget it.  Just my thoughts on it all, so follow me if you'd like @easantoli

  I finished up this memorial portrait and I'm very excited to give it to my patron.  The portrait progressed very smoothly and I really enjoyed working on it.  I really tried my best to capture a feeling of life and spirit in this piece.  
​  As a side note on technique, I had some thoughts about oiling out, which is the application of a thin layer of oil before you begin to paint to bring out sunken colors.  I recently read that oiling out could provide some problems for the longevity of your painting; the problems could arise from the fact that oil yellows with age and there's no way of removing old oil, unlike an old varnish.  I'm always concerned about the longevity of my paintings and thus, I will not be oiling out in the future.  I used to think it was necessary in order to ease my paint strokes, but that isn't true anyway.  Painting is an endless mystery.

  Have a nice evening everyone--

  This painting is going extremely well and I'm so happy that I restarted and am using my own style.  I also set up my palette of colors based on the colors I like using.  I don't like having a very complicated palette with too many colors because it makes painting feel like a chore.  Painting should be fun (most of the time).  Now I need to let this painting dry so I can oil out and paint again.
  Here's my current color palette:
-Silver White
-Naples Yellow
-Cadmium Yellow Light
-Chrome Yellow Deep
-Yellow Ochre
-Vermillion
-Chinese Vermillion
-Alizarin Crimson
-Brun Rouge
-Burnt Sienna
-Emerald Green (Veronese)
-Viridian
-Cobalt Blue
-Ultramarine Blue
-Cobalt Violet
-Raw Umber
-Burnt Umber
-Van Dyke Brown
-Ivory Black