Colin Bradley's Pastel Pencil Forums

I'm very new to pastels....only a few months now. I'm in the process of painting my tabby cat from a photo and I am having a problem with how to finish her eyes....where to put the highlight in her left eye (right eye for us looking at her) because she is not looking directly at the viewer. Her head is ever so slightly turned away and in the photo she seems to be looking slightly away from the camera. I originally had both highlights so it looked like she was looking directly at you...but then with the tilt of her head, it just didn't sit right (oops! pun!). So...I'm not sure where to put the highlight for her eyes. This portrait is unfinished...still lots of work to do on it! Any help and/or suggestions would be appreciated.

Hi Patricia
Thanks for posting the question, I think I can solve the problem for you. The key to getting this right is to first of all fill in the highlight on the right hand side, the eye on the left is fine dont alter that at all. Ok what you have left is a completely 'highlight less' eye on the left before we tackle the highlight fill in the top pst of the eye itself getting rid of that lighter brownish divisionseperating the top outside edge and pupil. Check your original photo this brownish division does not appear there. with this done replace the highlight using a white pastel pencil further over and this time follow the reference photo carefully and don't make the highlight too strong. This should create the effect that you want. If it works upload it so that everyone can see the difference. This is a good example that a lot of people have trouble with.
Thanks for sharing this problem with us. Colin.