Course Review: Portrait Painting Bootcamp

Instructor: Arthur Gain

Oct 17, 2024

I was interested in the instructor’s oil painting process
I wanted to improve my portrait and oil painting skills

Structure

Beginning March 30th, this was an 8-week online course with weekly, 3-hour Zoom sessions on Saturdays. During the online sessions, the instructor would demonstrate oil painting techniques while painting from a photo (or live model in later sessions). The sessions would be recorded and made available the next day for students unable to attend the online sessions. Students could join the designated Facebook group to share their works in progress and completed assignments, regardless of whether one took the feedback or audition version of the course. Weekly homework assignments would be listed in the online Alla Prima Academy platform where recordings of the Zoom sessions were also made available. Arthur Gain provided reference images for either master copies or his own pictures of the models he works with.

Lessons I learned from this course

How to see as a painter (squinting to see value groups)
Simplifying the human head into basic shapes and forms for the block-in and underpainting
Modeling the planes of the head/construction of the head
Premixing colors (limited to extended palettes) and average skin tones
Refining initial paint layer in subsequent layers (cleaning up edges and transitions)
Painting alla prima from a live model

Highlights/Favorite aspects

I found the color and average skin tone premixing video released before one of the Saturday sessions the most valuable. At this point of the course I was still struggling to understand how to mix the colors I owned, especially desaturating the pure pigments so my results don’t look so garish. Another valuable part of this course was when Arthur Gain demonstrated how to render a basic sphere by establishing its values. He then compared how this exercise can be applied when rendering a more complex shape-the human head.
The instructor and his assistant Kelsey (who moderated the chat during Zoom sessions) were very responsive to student questions that ranged from the basics (what brushes are being used, what colors are on the instructor’s palette, etc.) to more specific ones related to the week’s painting demonstration.
I liked that the instructor had some variety in facial structures for his demonstrations (his male models, both picture and live model wore beards). I was new to painting older male figures and it was a good challenge to improve my own painting skills.

Feedback

The class provided the opportunity to give feedback to the instructor. I don’t remember all the exact details I wrote, but I did suggest for future classes if there could be more diversity in the models (and reference images to practice for exercises) as painting subjects, particularly their range of skin tones. After this course, the instructor offered a mentorship program in which students showed examples of their works in progress. From what I could see, the instructor did take student feedback into account and provided reference images of a model with darker skin tones. (I saved the reference image to practice on my own outside that program, since I was unable to participate at the time :) )

Final Thoughts

This course felt like the right next step in developing my oil painting skills after taking an oil painting course back in 2023 (I will share a review for this course in the near future). I certainly learned a lot in how to develop the construction of the human head through oil paint and loved learning to mix colors!

At this time of this post, I am taking a new course offered by Arthur Gain, All Prima Challenge 2024. As the name indicates, is a course specifically focused on painting alla prima in oil. I will share my thoughts about this course once it is complete. There is some great stuff I am excited to talk about in a future post!

Here are some examples of exercises I did for the Portrait Painting Bootcamp: