Alex

I conducted an experiment where I put my portrait sketches through the app called Colorize, which is designed to turn black-and-white photos into colour. The aim was to see if the programme could recognise my sketches as people. Miraculously it did and above are the results.

I was worried that the app would either mistake Tilney for a girl, or for a caucasian. It did neither and as a result, I made little to no changes in photoshop.

Alex was given grey hair, bless him, so I coloured his hair brown in photoshop. I doubt he’d appreciate being mistaken for an older man. Being an absolute monarch does age you, however!

I did not expect the app to pick up Adrian’s freckles, but it did. I’m in shock. As for her red hair, I cheated a bit and put her through the Faceapp first to ensure Colorize knew she was a redhead.

Overall, I am pleasantly surprised I managed to trick a photo app into believing my sketches were real people.

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Alex is the protagonist in my series Friends of Foes. He shares the spotlight with Henry. He’s been bugging me to sketch a portrait of him since I first began sketching Henry. He still doesn’t understand why I didn’t sketch him first. After all, Alex is king – which ultimately puts him at the centre of the universe.

I had a lot of fun sketching Alex. I tried to keep it traditional and let his eyes shine without any embellishments from me. He’s supposed to look intense, so I hope I pulled it off. 😂

My least favourite feature to draw is the mouth. Alex’s mouth is particularly tricky because it’s long and thin – plus he smiles on one-side. To tackle this challenge… well basically I winged it until it looked somewhat presentable. Shh!

Another challenge I faced was that Alex’s head is positioned on an angle. This meant that I had to position his facial features accordingly. If one was is out of place, his face would look strange. So I used a ruler to ensure the measurements were exact. Alex would clobber me if I misrepresented any part of his regal face. Wish me luck!

I loved drawing his hair. He has longish, thick, brown hair that curls in interesting directions. I’ve never been very good at drawing males with long or medium-length hair but I actually think I’ve succeeded in not making him look like a girl. (yusss!).

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Tag: Alex

Tilney, Alex and Adrian in Colour