Halftone Portraits

Being heavily inspired by the portraiture work of Jonas Bersgtrand I set out to develop a stark style for capturing a likeness. This thread (when opening the twitter thread you may need to scroll up through through it in reverse order to see all the images) contains a long succession of attempts at mixing fixed width line work with minimal use of colour. Shadows are then segregated into two levels, complete darkness and halftones to capture anything else that’s not complete white.

Late into the thread I had gotten quite free with my line work and started to make some striking images. The cluster started with this piece of Johan Cruyff below and I then used the momentum to produce work of past players, subjects I’d never really approached before. The focus shifted a little towards the end and I created work of more modern players.

I find the 100% dark shadows so useful for sculpting a face, the method can really add a sense of drama to the subject. The fixed width line work and method of drawing are my efforts to mimic the cleanliness and focus of vector work whilst trapping some of my energy into the final art.

Subjects: Cruyff, Cantona, Garrincha, Yashin, Laudrup, Eusebio, Firmino, Messi, Torreira, Modric.

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My first book: Football Art

“Football Art” contains over 300 pieces of unique artwork I created between 2011 and 2018. I've used my love of the game to present a wide range of players, managers and teams with humour and affection making “Football Art” something any fan could return to time and again.

The book is arranged into 7 chapters: character design, memes, illustration, portraits, posters, design, sketches. Most chapters end with an essay related to that type of work. The 6 essays are: Principles of Character Design, Why I Make Memes, How I Get Ideas, Portrait Drawing Guide, Influences on my Work and My Work Life So Far. For the final essay slot I have included a look at my office and a list of tools I use plus ways to see more of my football art.

When in stock it’s available from my shop: danleydon.shop

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If you found this interesting you may enjoy my newsletter.
It goes out twice a month with exclusive artwork.
You can subscribe here.