HOW to DEAL with BAD REFERENCE Photos as a COMMISSIONED Artist

Isn't it very frustrating when having to deal with very bad reference photos? How to deal? Today we're going to have a relaxed discussion about how to deal with a really bad reference photo while working on my most recent commission. As a commissioned artist, we will all face this problem at some point. Many clients have lost their pets and have no way to take new photos, so all they have left are old photos, some even unusable. This is by far one of the biggest problems of a pet portrait or people portrait artist. When I first started drawing on commission, I had no idea what a reference photo should look like or what I was looking for in it.
#howtodealwithbadreferencephotos #badreferencephotos #badreferencephotosforartists
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I am a 28 years old artist from Romania but I live in Belgium now. I love drawing animals using mostly coloured pencils.
Thank you for watching!

[@DragosPepinaArt]

How do you deal with poor-quality reference photos?

[@charlescallery4420]

Great presentation with lots of useful information! Thanks Also great job on your drawing!

[@DragosPepinaArt]

Thank you!

[@Averyxs5900]

Great video and nice points! I will be using these definitely 😁i loved the portrait that was being worked on as well very good job ❤️

[@DragosPepinaArt]

Thank you!

[@crystalheart9]

Helpful video and your portrait is beautiful.

[@DragosPepinaArt]

Thank you!

[@jamesaritchie1]

I HATE copying good photos, and I stopped doing so a long time ago. I saw no sense in copying something that was already as good as it could get. Just print a copy. It's a lot easier, faster, and cheaper. Want it to look like a drawing of a painting? Photoshop can do this in a minute. I had zero fun, and zero interest. Memory personal life experience, and imagination make art, not copying an existing photo. Bad photos, on the other hand, off a challenge, and are a chance to give someone something that thought was lost. I always ask if the photo has been shown to someone who is expert at restoring old, bad photos. If not, it should be. But when it goes through this process and is still horrible, it's time for an artist to show he or she is an artist, and not just a second hand camera that can only copy like a human Xerox machine. The work is exactly like that of a police sketch artist, and the same type of program is a good way to start. When everything possible has been done this way, the artist can then do the rest.

[@DragosPepinaArt]

The realism is a very controversial topic, you either love it or hate it. For example I enjoy it a lot, it's not about copying a photo, it's about how the creating process makes me feel and it takes me to a world where the time stops and I connect with myself. I also love doing something special for people that lost their pets. A drawing is not just a copied photo, it's their pet seen through my eyes, it's about understanding shapes, colors, tones. In conclusion, we are all different and we don't enjoy the same things.

[@jamesaritchie1]

​@@DragosPepinaArt I'm not against copying photos. People should do what they want, what gives them happiness. I'm just explaining why I don't make copies, and why I do enjoy cleaning up really bad reference photos. Back to one point first. It really is exceedingly easy to produce a photo or print that looks exactly like a drawing or painting, which is one more reason why I don't like doing copies. Anyway, to me, it's just a copied photo. I'm doing something that a camera has already done better. There is NO creative process. How can there be when creativity means something original? Copying a photo with pencils or even paint, is no more creative than copying it with a printer. It takes more skill, but skill is NOT art. Skill is what you combine with memory, personal life experience, and IMAGINATION to create art. Many say the old masters copied live subjects, and this was no different. In fact, they almost never directly copied anything, including people. They made changes in the background in order to say something, look at the Mona Lisa, and even made changes to the people who paid them to do a portrait. Just as important, when they were forced to do a portrait as exactly as possible, they did it for money, not art. Even them, most preferred the painting to portray them better than they really looked. Too, no one else anywhere was going to do that same painting in the same way. And that was a different time where photos didn't exist. The paintings and drawings were the photos, and no one copied them. But should it be done, it isn't art, it's just a forgery, a fake. But drawing a scene from life, even when that scene is of people, especially when that scene is something special, is not at all the same as copying a photo you didn't even take. I've known painted who could copy anything. As most of us were taught, they copied the Old Master in order to learn how to paint. I was never that good, but three or four were so good only an expert could tell their paintings from the real thing. One of them copied the Mona Lisa so well it was uncanny. Perfect. But do you think that copy will ever hang on a museum wall? No, of course not. It isn't original, and there is no creativity in copying it. If a perfect copy of the Mona Lisa isn't art, isn't worth displaying, then how is an exact copy of a photo any better? Especially when you didn't even take the photo, which can be art, can be creative. There's a website that has copyright free photos for artists. One of these photos is of a wolf's head, and it stands out from other photos of its kind. I don't know whether the photographer got lucky and stumbled across this shot, or whether getting it was the result of days, weeks, months of effort, but it is stunning. I've never seen a wolf like that, or a photo that showed what a wolf is really like as much as that one does. That photo is art. So far, I've found nine hyperrealism drawings of that photo, each perfect, each beautifully done, each showing great skill, and each exactly alike. There is zero creativity there, and zero art. And if I've found nine copies with a half-hearted search, they are probably a hundred more out there. None of this means I'm right and you're wrong. It's just how I feel, my thinking process, what makes me happy, and why. People are different, and it's all to the good.

[@ArtInspiredFingers]

@@jamesaritchie1 I understand what both of you are saying. I just wanted to ask both of you what you have to say for this portrait I made(kzbin.info/www/bejne/bIrYZqqmmNeUY9U) as these were the only recent pics I had. Since I did not have anyone who could make them better in photoshop [can it be done??] so I made portrait. Could you tell me if the portrait is done right or any improvements possible? Thank you.

[@PetManiaOfficial]

Keep up the good work!

[@DragosPepinaArt]

Thank you!