M family 15 portraits

Since August I have been working on portraits for the "M" family. It has become a tradition for them to order Christmas portraits from me every year, and I am honored that they keep coming back! Sometimes I have just one portrait per kid, once I did two; this time I had three portraits per kid, for a total of 15 drawings. I suppose I could have done a repeat of the same picture three times, but that would have been drudgery. Besides, now it will be harder for the family to decide which portrait goes to which recipient. Haha.
In order for me to finish these on time, I had to stick to a schedule of so many drawings per month. This meant I had to get started even when there might not be good photos available for me to work with yet.
With this family, I get to pick the photos I want from the pictures they've posted on Facebook. This is nice because I get to choose, but also annoying when the pictures aren't high quality. When one kid might not have any good pictures up yet, I try to wait on drawing that child in hopes that a better picture will show up in time for me to draw it.
This has been an interesting study in what a difference the photo makes when you get a portrait done (for any of you who might want such a thing in the future.) Sometimes one I thought looked good will pale in comparison to a later portrait from a better photo.
So, is the picture low quality and pixelated? I might not be able to see the details very good. Even the angle might change what they look like: is the camera too close and distorting the shape of their face? All things to consider when choosing a photo.
So I've organized these with the three pictures of each kid together, with my least favorite of the three first, and my favorite last in each group.

A.
I like all three of these, but I find it interesting that they all look like a completely different girl! Also, she looks a lot like River. Each photo was under completely different lighting, and I had to zoom in to varying degrees. At first, the middle portrait was my favorite, and I still really love it. The photo was crisp and up close, the lighting was pretty good, and the expression was cute.
 But when I drew the third one, I was absolutely in love with it. I predict the family will like the second one best because it's so fun, but I can't stop obsessing over the third. The photo was dark and I wasn't too happy about it, but it turned out so awesome. I love how her face blends into the shadows on the edge, I love the colors,the direction of the light, and the softness of it. Of course, I tend to prefer more serious or subtle expressions to big smiles, so there's that too. It's my favorite out of all 15 drawings for sure. The photo here doesn't do it justice.

B
This is "A"s brother. They all turned out well, and again the angles make him look very different in each one. The light was kind of orange in the first photo, but I like the way it translated to the drawing, and his funny expression. I like the second one because I think it looks most like him, from the photos I've seen.  I waited till the very end of November to do his last portrait,because I couldn't find a good photo anywhere. When I blew this one up it was very pixelated, so there are no hard lines in the drawing, but it just gives it a pastel-like texture, and I kind of like it. The expression is great too!

 
 

C
Out of all the kids, I feel like this girls portraits were somehow the least successful. The first one I though was okay when I drew it, but the more I look at it, the less I like it. She kind of has a fake smile, and there is something weird about her nose. The eyes are odd too. The second one is the one I drew first. It's shadowy, which is okay (I mean, look at the first baby's picture that I like) but it was hard to see the details in her mouth and I'm not sure it looks like her enough. In retrospect, a different background color might have been better too.
The third one is by far the best. I think it looks like her, but a bit older somehow. I like the colors a lot. I just finished this one in November.

 

UPDATE:
So I decided to make a fourth picture of this girl. This put me a week over my self-imposed deadline, but I really wanted to do it. I used this one to replace the portrait with the yellow shirt, but for a while I was debating on replacing the second one instead, because it's not my favorite. I hope they like this one! The photo had crazy colored hair, so I made up the hair colors, based on the light.  The background is the same color some of her hair was dyed in the photo.




D
So on the first picture, the lighting was dark, and she was far away so the resolution was bad too. I thought I could make it look better as I drew it, but I wasn't very successful. She looks okay, and is posing cute, but I wish her hair was down or something. I used it because it was a first day of school picture.
 At first, the second portrait was my favorite of her. The photo was outside, it was close up so had good resolution, and you could even see freckles on her face, which I didn't even know she had! But then I finished the last one, and I love it even more. The photo was good enough that I could zoom in closer, she's wearing cute clothes, and she has a cute smile. I'm sure the family will love that one best. In the photo, she actually had some face paint on, so I had to omit that in the drawing.This photo doesn't do justice to the colors in her face, like her pink cheeks!






 


E

Everytime I draw this family, they don't have many pictures to choose from for this guy. I guess he's really active and it's hard to get him to hold still. Fortunately, I got several this time.
The first was a very shadowy, pixelated picture, but it still worked out well. I like his smile and the colors in that one.
This second one is great; it was in the daylight, he's smiling, and it was close-up. I drew it first. The third picture is my favorite. I like the angle of the photo, his serious expression, and the colors that were there! I think the family will like the happier ones better, but I like this one second out of all the portraits I drew this time.

 

Are there any that stood out to you?