Ethan done with the background...color mixing is still a trial for me - I will say that my alizarin crimson which is Grumbacher brand is very oily and very transparent, but it was what I already had at home. Ear still needs correction as we move forward.

Ethan with the darks applied; I already know I messed up the ear and will have to redo it...both from a shape perspective as well as using the correct dark value in the deeper shadows. I might have some drawing. areas in the shirt area as well. Why don't you use the average shadow color on the mustache area? BTW, I admire the fact that your clothes have no oil paint on them....a bit tricky keeping my work area and myself clean LOL

Oh my, I found this difficult as my first mix of alizarin crimson and white ended up too pink and stayed that way when I added the ochre light to it. Reworked my several of the light values in the attached to try and get rid of the reddish hue. This photograph is a bit misleading as to color as it's taken under a yellowish light. The background was actually grey mixed media paper but it and the colors appear more yellow. So I learned its important to get the initial mixture right tending to orange instead of red.

Since my canvas boards were still drying from gesso I decided to attempt this with pastel on grey Canson M-T. I put a value scale on top; I think I got a bit confused between half tone and reflected light which may have been because they were both so close to the value of the paper. Good exercise.

This looks simpler than it is. First of all I had a hard time identifying my local skin color. The left side is my sunny day; felt good about my cloudy day until they dried and I took the picture as they seem quite close. Value in color is definitely my weak area.

I used a combination of folding paper and using the ruler to complete.

Here is my grid drawing; was a pleasant experience compared to free handing it.