The gentleman

Great portrait Michael. It’s the point of focus the face, hands done well the rest supports the focal point.

I totally agree with John, Especially like the hand,

A brilliant portrait Michael. The detail of the face and the hand and arm are superb. Great fleshtones.

Great facial expression.

Great portrait.

great piece Michael, love the hand especially.

Great pose and fabulous painting Michael.

Thank you for your comments. Hands have always been a problem to me so I have been including them in quite a few portraits recently to try to improve

Great face and arm ... I don't think the clothes let is down at all

An amazing result in all aspects Michael.

Great work

A very good portrait Michael, excellent composition. I only recently heard about water soluble oils. That messes with my head somewhat! :) I always thought there were oil based oils and water based acrylics.

Hi Jon, I bought them about 2 years ago having previously used mainly watercolours and acrylics. I tried them once, then packed them up and left them on the shelf for a year. I started using them again about Jan Feb time and found that, despite taking a while to get used to, were really rather good. Obviously I’m still in the learning stage but I think I prefer them to acrylics now. You use linseed oil as the medium and the water basically replaces the turps. Extra bonus is no smell either. I would thoroughly recommend them although don’t expect to fall in love immediately.

I do see what you mean about the clothes, and suspect the problem lies in the quality of the paint - as a side issue, you don't need to use Turps or any other solvent with regular oils, and I suspect you'd get on better with them than with water-miscibles (they're not really water-soluble, but that's a technical discussion for another day). Leaving aside your or my feelings about the medium, though! You've painted a distinctive and excellent portrait, of real character; I suspect it's only paint-geeks like me who would even notice any issues with the paint.