How much 'negative' space is too much?
 

I am wondering about the negative space around the subject in a portrait. How much space is too much? I understand it's up to the individual artist, and even what the painting is trying to convey. But in a traditional 3/4 portrait, how much is too much? I've read about putting the head 2" from the top of the canvas. Though I just spent some time with an Andrew Wyeth book and in one of his portraits, the head and shoulders filled the bottom half of the canvas and the top half was negative space. Very interesting.

I suppose anything goes, but I would love to hear any input on this. If we're talking about a painted head that is about 6 to 6 1/2" for a child, does this fit better on a 16"x20" or a 20"x24" canvas? Would a larger canvas give it too much negative space, assuming the same 6 1/2" head? I'm going to post a photo of what I'm going to paint, it's not the best photo, it's blurry, but you get the idea. And the cat (!) will take some work to get right, but this is the POSE I'm talking about.

thank you all,

Joan

Hi Joan,

I think you hit on the answer when you said that each painting is different, and it depends on what you want to convey. There is no formula!

When I begin a portrait I always start with a concept. I decide what I want to say visually, and an idea begins to form in my mind. Either I'm painting from life, or I'm using photo references to compose the painting, or a combination of the two plus preliminary sketches. Let's assume you are using a photo because that's what it looks like you are doing.

I first decide on one photo to use as a general compositional reference. This photo has the general pose the way I want it. (I might use others for the head, for the cat, the fingers, etc.) I decide where I want the borders to be, and block out the rest of the photo or extend the photo edge. It's important to leave extra space on all sides. I often extend the background color by using pieces of reject photos. That way I can play with the borders, moving them in and out until I decide how much space I want around my subject. Next, I decide on the head size. I measure the head in the photo and the length of the entire photo. I use the proportion of head length/photo length, cross-multiply with the head length I want in the portrait (6.5"), and fill in the missing dimension, which will be the length of the canvas. Then I figure out the width of the canvas by creating another l/w proportion. I then stretch my own canvas.

If you would rather use a pre-stretched canvas, you can start with the proportion of head length (6.5") to canvas length, then see how the width of the canvas compares proportionally to the width of your reference photo. I mess with the width of the reference to see if I can get a pleasing composition. If I can't, then I do not use a pre-stretched canvas.

What I'm saying is that really it is much better to arrive at your canvas size by making a conceptual/compositional decision rather than trying to determine an ideal canvas size--which doesn't exist.

I like your reference photo a lot--beautiful light, and that green turned out well. It does make beautiful cool shadows, in the cat, too.

Alex

Great ideas!
 

Hi Alexandra,

Thank you for your thoughtful reply. I understand all the math that you're talking about! It's exactly what I do, except I, as you said, am dealing with prestretched canvas. I did stretch a few some years ago, but that was putting the cart before the horse. I need to spend my time practicing my painting, not stretching canvas. So for now, I'm using prestretched.

I had a 16" x 20" for this portrait, but today went and got a 20" x 24". I think there is going to be too much space around her on that size canvas. Sometimes 2" abolve the head seems too little, but then 10" would be too much. I guess I'm trying to push the limits to see how much space I can put around the figure without the figure seeming lost.

I really like your method of deciding on the canvas size in a smaller scale, then enlarging all your measurements. I go to Kinko's and make enlargements of my photos (200 % today!) and then come home and lay them out on the different canvas sizes. Your way sounds easier!

Yesterday I went into my daughters room with a measuring tape and measured her face, chin to hairline. I had just read a long post on the forum about head size. My daughter says "What are you doing?" and I told her I was measuring her head for her portrait. (I wanted to make sure my painting was less than life size). And she answered, "only in this house!". I guess measuring your kids' head isn't something that happens in every home!

I will play with the borders/negative space and see just how much is too much. This thread started because on another thread Linda Brandon mentioned that she liked a lot of space around her figures, if I understood her correctly. That's when I started thinking about the "how much is too much" question.

thanks,

Joan

More of model?
 

I am wondering if I should include more of the model and cat? My first inclination is not too, since adding more of the cat and my daughters lower body don't add anything to the overall picture. Any thoughts?

This is the uncropped version of my reference photo.

thank you,

Joan

Hi there!

I'd love to get more into this conversation, but I have little time so my input will be limited. ;C

About the 1st photo you posted: I don't feel that there is too much negative space there, but I do not like the poition of the cat. It seems to weigh that area of the portrait, and is distracting the way it is cropped. But, I could see this one working just fine without the cat, if she just had her arms relaxed and meeting in front of her off the picture plane.

The 2nd picture is almost there, I'd just add a little more space so that the cat isn't cut off. Then, the cat will be better balanced by your daughter, and you will have pleasing negative space on the top and bottom of the picture. See Chris Saper's "Cotton's Kid" to get an idea of what I mean.

Lovely model, I love the green color, can't wait to see the portrait, I hope to get back to or at least read more of this thread later!

Cropped cat
 

Hi Lacey,

Thank you for your post. Hmm, I see what you mean about the cat being cropped in the first one. I didn't want the cat to draw too much attention, I was thinking he would be a minor part of the portrait. He would have to be a white cat! But if I can't crop him successfully, then I've got the whole cat in the photo.

It's not absolutely necessary that the cat be in the painting, though I would prefer it, as I'm sure my daughter would. But not to the detriment of the painting.

I think you mean to pull down the border on the second one? More space around the bottom of the photo?

Thank you again,

Joan

I like the top one - except you need to bring it below her elbow so that after framing the elbow is in there at least a couple inches from the bottom.

The bottom one is perhaps ungraceful in the bit of leg that is showing?

My 2-cents!

Cropping
 

Hi Kim,

Thank you very much for your reply. I agree with you about that little bit of leg showing :sunnysmil .

You're right about the elbow. I think I have another photo of the cat so his paw won't be chopped off either once I crop below the elbow.

I wonder if this portrait is becoming too much about the cat?

Joan

Standing
 

For tomorrow's photo shoot, since it seems like we have one every day around here, I may get my daughter to stand holding the cat. That would eliminate that leg showing.

But then to keep to the 6 1/2" head, the whole canvas needs to be bigger and I just didn't want to do such a big portrait.

Pretty soon this is going to be just a head and shoulders of my daughter, no darn cat! I think I will have to wait 'til tomorrow to look at this with fresh eyes for the solution.

Joan

No more cat
 

I've decided to keep this simple, it's getting way too complicated. So I'm taking out the cat. I need to keep this simple so I can be successful. I'll do a little painting of the cat for my daughter's room, just the cat.

I'm down to two choices. In the first one the color is better, more true to life. There isn't much room to her left, I would add some space in the painting on her left.

The second one is an example of what I would consider lots of space around the model. Too much? The color is a bit washed out, but I can get my daughter to come in here to look at her color.

She's holding a stuffed animal, that won't be there. That was the substitute for the cat since the cat had NO patience for photos.

I value all your opinions greatly and appreciate all the help with this portrait,

Joan

Joan, if you are going to eliminate the cat and just do a head-and-shoulders (all these decisions apparently happened after I had turned off my computer so I'm just catching up), I would definitely go for the first of the two. Her position in the frame is more dynamic, and actually the lack of space on her left doesn't bother me at all. You have a diagonal created by the slant of her head and her chest that creates a nice dynamic in the rectangle. That dynamic is diminished by putting her in the center and balancing out the negative space on all sides of her. I can really feel the difference. If you put in more space to the left, you are really just creating dead space that doesn't need to be there. By contrast, that triangle of space to the right needs to be there. That is my opinion!

Alex

Hi Again!

I wish I had been able to keep up with this thread yesterday! The subject is so interesting to me.

First of all, I like the cat a lot. I think it's because I, personally, love my kitten who is my first pet cat, so I may just be biased in that way. Including the cat makes it more personal, special, and somewhat narrative to me. But, I understand how taking him out simplifies things!

If you are going to do it without the cat, I agree with what Alex said. The 1st one of the batch with no cat looks good to me, and I would not add any more negative space behind her, to our left.

Here is a really poorly illustrated idea if you want to keep the cat! (Nudge, nudge.) Maybe the cropping will work if you include one or both of your daughter's hands. I feel like the cat is floating, or going to fall off the scene in the 1st picture that you posted... there is visual tension because of that for me and that is why the cat is distracting me there. I think if you could use a hand or both hands to show that the cat is being held up, sort of frame the cat, and then direct the eye back up to the face, it would be a darling composition. Just the one hand that I have painted in would do the trick, I think.

Oh, and I hope that you don't mind me fooling with your photos. :D

Either way, I can't wait to see what you do!

Joan, it's easier for me to talk about what's "too tight" than it is to formulate a space rule -- though maybe there is one. The most important thing to remember is that these are essentially taste issues and how you, the artist, makes a selection based on all the choices out there. Lots of artists crop tight and it's part of their style; they make it work very well for them and the people who buy their work love it. Look at lots of portraits - not photos of people, look at paintings - and decide which ones look right to you. Do the subjects feel lost in space, or maybe lost amidst all their belongings, or do they maybe feel pushed up into your face? The most important thing to remember when working from a photo is that you are not stuck with the parameters of the photo. You are the boss.

As far as your photos are concerned, I'd go with a three-quarter view with hands because it will give you some practice painting them and you'll also have a three-quarter sample to show potential clients. Your daughter is beautiful, what a wonderful model you have here.

So much help!
 

Dear Alexandra, Lacey and Linda,

I woke up this morning and turned on my computer and was overwhelmed by all the wonderful help I'm getting from such talented artists on this project. My plan was just to do the head and shoulders when I went to bed last night, but now I'm thinking I'll put in that cat after all.

Alexandra,

I think you hit the nail on the head when you say this. I have been studying portraits on the Stroke of Genius site and yes, I don't want to put space around something just for the sake of space. I'll attach a little 12"x12" I did recently. Almost NO space around this girl with the glasses and braids.

Lacey,

Thank you for taking the time to fool with my photos! You have shown me how the cat can work. If it looked like he was about to slide off my daughters lap it was because he was. I think your idea of adding a hand somehow will solve the problem of the cat sliding off the page. I have a better photo of the cat which I'm going to try and use, I don't have photoshop so I've cobbled together my xeroxes from Kinko's to get an idea. I think this is going to work!

Linda,

Thank you for your thoughtful suggestions. I have taken your advice and studied some portrait paintings. I think my problem is that I like both, space and no space. I'm attaching a small painting I did of a friend (glasses and braids), she's a hip young woman and the close cropped format just worked for her. That was an easy decision. I guess I just don't want my portraits to be boring, and with that said I guess equal negative space around figures tends to make them boring? As you said, there are no rules, I just have to keep trying different things. I'm beginning to see where Photoshop could come in handy.

thank you all,

Joan

p.s. My daughter is wearing that wrinkled white shirt because I took this photo at 7:00 a.m. She already had on her dark blue uniform shirt for school and she didn't want to hold a white cat, so I told her just to grab anything and throw it on for a quick photo!

Cat or no cat?
 

Joan, I didn't want to force you into a decision about whether or not to include the cat, but if you are considering it I will admit I like this scheme better. (As Linda said, it's all a matter of taste, or money, too, in the case of commissioned portraits.) I think If you could get that other hand in at the bottom right, you are on to something. I like the lean of her body in the first photos, but the position of the cat in the first photo has an odd anatomical illusion of having two left front paws, so I would take more photos of the cat to get a better "read" of his/her body. Anyway, in general these are great reference photos and I think something good is underway with this portrait!

Alex

More photos
 

Thank you Alex for your reply. I think I can make the cat work, especially with so much help!

I have taken a few more photos, here are two.

I like the first one but I'm not sure what others would think? It certainly evokes emotion, laughter on my part when I see my daughter holding up that big cat. But I think a portrait should evoke some kind of emotion. And this isn't a commission, just something I want to do for myself. Though, point taken, I am trying to build a portfolio. I had my daughter stand and hold the cat for the first one.

In the second one my daughter has a nice expression, we've got the hand holding the cat and the cat in a pretty good position. Though his face could be better, I can fix that.

I like both of these as they are and wouldn't have to cobble together photos, which makes me more comfortable with this whole process. On, except improve on the cats expression in the first one.

Thank you, looking forward to what y'all think about these.

Joan

Last one
 

One last photo. I took the second photo and I cropped it some. What do you think? Maybe with some work on the cat, but how is this composition?

Joan

Here's my two cents on all the various subjects that have come up in this thread:

I think more space around a subject makes it look more like a portrait and less like a snapshot. I also think it's a bit more elegant. I'm tending to want to put more space around my subjects in my current work, too. Purely subjective, of course. Lots of empty space does make for a big canvas or a small head size, things that some of my clients would prefer to avoid, though.

I love cats. That said, lose the cat. At least that's my thinking. With the cat it becomes a double portrait and that means both subjects have to be posed properly, not looking awkward, not looking like they want to be somewhere else, etc. If the cat doesn't look great in the photo you won't be able to make it look great in the painting. It will completely distract from the excellent job you do with your daughter.

I recommend you use a tripod. Almost all the shots are blurry.

I'd suggest that you might want to consider stretching your own canvases. It's not hard. Pre stretched canvases generally are of an inferior quality, and also give you much less flexibility for compositions. Hardly any of my compositions would fit a standard size canvas.

I also highly recommend you get Photoshop, or some less expensive competitor, and a photo printer. Maybe you could ask Santa. There is an absoutely HUGE benefit to being able to size, crop, compose your own reference, in high quality color, whenever you want it. I literally couldn't work without it.

Keep us posted on how this progresses! I look forward to seeing how you work all these issues out.

List for Santa
 

Hi Michele,

Thank you for your post and all of your excellent suggestions. I think this is such an interesting subject, the idea of negative space around the model, I will be watching your portraits to see how you continue to handle this. I can see how this would be a dilema for your clients though, since not everybody has a home that can handle a huge portrait with lots of space around it and as you said, otherwise the head size may get smaller.


I have never done a double portrait and I've come to realize that a double portrait isn't just twice as difficult as a single portrait, there is some kind of exponential relationship going on here!

That one is already on my Christmas list. Although last night I asked my husband about a tripod I thought we had and I had it in my hands 2 minutes later. It's a little 'travel' type that only does horizontal photos, so I will be getting a new one. But, for today's photo shoot of my daughter, at least I'll have one. Thank you for reinforcing that I do need a tripod.

Ughh, all that time. I have stretched my own canvas before and I actually enjoyed it. I even sized them with the rabbit glue and then primed them with oil primer. What a process. I did 5 or 6 at a time. I know my painting ability and I need to spend the time painting, one of these days I'll go back to stretching my own canvas. But for now I think that's putting the cart before the horse for me.

Photoshop. I guess I should make that investment. Santa will have quite a list from me. I was thinking about a new camera too. I just got the Epson R300 printer and I love it. Though I can't figure out the 'tiling' method of printing out something larger than 8" x 10". I think I read in one of your posts that that's what you do.

Whew, that's a lot to think about! I have slept on this . . . for three nights now! . . . and my gut is telling me to keep this simple. Another photo shoot today (with tripod!) and I'll see what that gets me.

thanks again Michele,

Joan

Update
 

Okay, here is the update on the portrait of my daughter and cat. I'm going to reshoot using a tripod because the couple of photos that I like best are fuzzy. Yesterday (Thurs.) I had my portrait class and didn't get home until dinner time, too dark to take photos. But, at least I did some painting. Today, Friday, my daughter has a game and won't be home until dark. So, tomorrow is the day for the photo shoot. I find my artificial light set-up works better supplemented with some daylight coming in through the windows. And, tomorrow I'm going to pick the best photo and go with it! This is frustrating, taking an entire week to get a decent photo of my daughter and cat. I really had planned to paint her this week, not spend the whole week picking a photo.

I'm only going to paint my daughter and it's going to be a head and shoulders only. With the holidays approaching I don't want to get in over my head so I'm going to try and paint my daughter, and then my son, before Christmas.

Whew, getting a good reference photo is a lot of work. I know it'll be a lot easier without the cat. And hopefully next time it'll be easier. If I'm ever going to paint non-family members, I need to be able to take a good reference photo without having 5 photo shoots, don't ya think! :bewildere

I may try her with the cat again after the holidays.

Joan

My apologies for being so late to weigh in here ! (Negative spaces are one of my very favorite topics:0 ) I have little to add to the already excellent suggestions, just a few bits of information to share. Peggy Baumgaertner offers a guideline that there should be at least a "forehead's height" between the frame and the top of the hair. I think that's a useful thing to consider, although certainly the individual artist's choice has to trump everything else.

Visually, our eyes tend to "sink" objects into the bottom of the frame - that's the reason the matted work should add a little bit of width to the bottom edge of the mat, and if I recall from art history, one of the key considerations to the Acropolis design. The larger an object is, the greater the viewing distance becomes, which I think that magnifies the "sink factor". Balancing negative spaces includes things like the amount of room you give for example, below the fingers, to the left of the elbow, etc. Anytime pictorial elements get to close to the frame they start to gather unwanted attention.

It's also essential (and increasingly critical as the painting becomes smaller) to take into account the 3/8" frame rabbet that will cover the canvas borders once framed. I think most of us have had the experience of placing our lovely work work in a frame only to discover that the the head was chopped, or the arm created a tangent with the frame, or any number of things that destroy the composition.

So true, and one of the chief reasons for failed paintings. It's worth every minute you invest into getting the best resource you can, even if you don't end up painting it!

And yes, the cat really does mean a double portrait, in that your reference for the cat has to be just as good as your reference for the subject.

Edges
 

Hi Chris,

Thank you for your reply. Thank you for pointing this out, I think I knew this instinctively, but having this worded so well will surely save me time in the future when I'm trying to decide how to crop something.

This is such an interesting subject, I've enjoyed all the comments and learned so much.

Joan

Final final photo shoot!
 

This weekend I finally got a chance to take some more photos of my very patient daughter with the tripod I dug up.

I spent some time cropping this and have 3 different compositions that I like and I was going to post one of those, but then I thought it might be interesting to post the original uncropped version and just listen to what the knowledgeable people on this forum have to say about where it should be cropped.

If there is one thing I've learned, there is more than one way to skin a cat. (Speaking of cats, our kitty is no longer a part of this project.) I'm learning how there is no one 'right' answer, but many 'right' answers. Though I suppose one could argue there is the one 'best' answer, but that best answer is the one that satisfies the artist (and client).

I look forward to your comments.

Joan

Uncropped photo of my son
 

This is the uncropped version of the photo I'll use for my son, just for anyone who is interested in seing how this ongoing project is going.

I welcome any comments!

Joan

Hi Joan,
I wonder if you should try some other expressions as well now that you are in the process of making references.
Tell them not to smile but instead tell you something that they have heard or seen. While they are talking you don

Hi Allan,

Thank you for your suggestions, but we're done with the photo shoots! :o I have been taking photos of my daughter for 7 days and I have learned a lot about light bulbs, lighting, etc. but, now I need to paint. I could spend another week taking more photos, but I really need the practice with painting. If I don't paint my kids this week, then it won't happen until after the holidays. I can always paint them again, and again and again after the first of the year!

I am happy with their expressions, actually I have a better close-up of my son, but somehow I must have deleted the original uncropped version. That's why I put that similar photo in my post for cropping suggestions. I'll post the close-up of his face, I like this expression a little better.

My goal was to get photos with good lighting and nice shadows. I am happy with the results I got, these are so much better than what I have been using for reference material! I'm come a long way with the help from this forum.

I will try your suggestion next time I take their photos.

thank you,

Joan

Hi Joan,
I would suggest a cropping like this.
Good luck, Allan

Cropping
 

Hi Allan,

Thank you for your post, sorry it's taken me two day to thank you, no internet for a day and then other stuff going on around here.

I like the way you have cropped the image, this in fact was one of the three ways that I came up with. I am intrigued lately with square paintings, I'm not sure why. So it was either a 12x16" rectangular, or possibly 16x20", but the bigger canvas always seems like it has too much negative space. That's probably just my taste and level of inexperience talking at the moment. It's all in what one's eye gets used to and I will probably think completely differently in 6 months about that negative space. Like Michele mentioning that she like more negative space around her subjects lately. Or . .. I was thinking a square composition.

Thank you again, I think it's interesting to see what someone else would do with the same image!

Joan

Dear Joan,
by now you must have already worked a lot on these ones.
I found this discussion very interesting, and wanted to add another element.
I have found that less negative space will increase the sense of intimacy. A closer crop suggests that the painter has taken one step forward and is closer to the subject.
I found this tighter composition has worked quite well for my children's portrait, while once, when I cropped a portrait of two brothers too close, they looked like they were prisoners in a box, a really unsuccessful painting on which I had worked a lot, I still regret the missed opportunity.
I hope you will post the finished paintings
Ilaria