Monster Portrait

I've been busy finishing up my children's book lately and I haven't had much time to work on any personal work. I made some time to finish painting up a piece I drew a little while ago and I thought I'd share my process with everyone in case anyone's curious as to how the piece evolves as I work on it.

1. Quick, loose drawing just to find something fun, threw some value down to pop the silhouette
2. Basic under-painting. I usually like to work from dark to light
3. Starting to render, not too contrasty just yet, just trying to figure out colors mostly
4. Getting more detailed, render render render
5. Upping the contrast to give things more pop
6. More of the same, adding some nastiness in the face to add more interest
7. Adding a secondary light source to pop out the silhouette more and to vary the colors
8. Color Dodge layers to introduce subtle color shifts in flesh, adding more interest
9. Even MORE detail
10. Finishing touches...

This is the final product! I hope you enjoyed seeing my process. I'd like to show more of these in the future.