This post is for my portrait student in our discussion about lighting the model for portraits. I quickly pasted together a few examples to explain myself better.
The classic 3/4 view in portrait lighting. Light on both sides of the face with a strong ‘Van Dyck Z’. Painter stands between the window and the model:
Portrait lighting with light on the far side of the face, half-tone or shadow on the nose:
The portrait model lit from both sides, much more difficult to pull off in my opinion (the Serov on the left has light bouncing from everywhere in the room):
The portrait model with half the face in full shadow, seems to very popular with self portraits:
I couldn’t find good historic examples of the high light-source, raccoon effect which is popular today in portrait painting. There are more lighting possibilities than just these four, but I figure this is a good start.
Someone sent me this link to a tutorial on lighting, one of the better ones I’ve seen.