Individual portrait done from photo.

A3 size portrait of a man.
Medium used: Charcoal on textured paper.
Client's purpose: Corporate gift.

The client from Mindef came to me & ordered a portrait to be presented to the subject who was a retired army general. The photo used was a passport photo of the subject's present look. Not long after he'd collected the artwork, he came back to order another piece & requested me to draw the subject say 20 years younger base on the same photograph.
I did it by eliminating the excess fat on his face as well as his white hair. The face was made slimmer & smoother to further enhanced it. To draw somebody younger than his age needs a lot of imagination on my side.
This was not the first time I encounter such request though. I remember about 10 years ago when I was drawing live sketches on the street, a man who was in his 60s asked me to sketch his present look & he was quite impressed by the close resemblance. After that, he requested me to draw him 20 years younger & then 40 years younger. He didn't mind to pay for the 3 portraits. When he saw the last portrait, he was so amazed that he immediately took out one of his passport photos which was taken during his 20s & showed it to me. He kept telling me that the resemblance was very close. Just before he paid up, he gave me a remark, saying "well, you can really made a living by drawing people, well done". How amazing...