Portrait, Avocado, Ryu

So this is kind of my last chance to make it in art. After finishing university and earning a bachelors in biology,  my parents won't support me for too long until I have to get a serious job or go back to school again. I'm really trying to learn to paint now, both digitally and traditionally. Although I'll likely be doing more digital work as that is where I plan to specialize in.

I'm planning to work my ass off and make up for all those false starts I had in the past. There would always be plans to begin to work hard and achieve great skill, accompanied by "more to come" comments, but the more never came. I really think I'm meant to do art, I don't even notice time when drawing or painting (lol this helps with my constant snacking at home). Here are some paintings I've done over the past few days.

This first pair is a self portrait done from life entirely in photoshop. The frist painting is the original done by eye. I think I have a tendency to limit my value range in pictures as my contrast is weak. I played with filters in photoshop and used some masks to produce the painting below.

This avocado is done from life to improve and practice my painting skills and color picking. I really like the color scheme of the avocado, it makes me want to design an outfit based on it.

Finally a Ryu I did entirely from imagination. The painting style I've been using is kind of a hybrid of tips and tricks I've picked up, but the painterly look is done using a scatter brush. This is something I learned long ago on the Shoryuken.com forums when i would lurk there. User SFMC made a digital painting tutorial and I thought it looked cool. I don't think I've done it justice though, I need to work on adding more colors and using hard edges more. 

I'm currently working through Bammes' book "Complete Guide to Life Drawing," and will continue to practice painting. If anyone has any critiques or recommendations, feel free to comment and let me know.

Thanks for reading!