Advice for Painting Fleshtones

[MintFish]

So I've taken my first stab at painting Caucasian skin and am seeking a little advice on where to push this. For the below examples (apologies for poor image quality) I've used several layers of the Rosy Skintones Triad from Reaper. Started with Rosy Skin, painted in shadows using Rosy Shadow, worked back up to Rosy Skin and then did about three layers working up to pure Rosy Highlight. The result came out a lot paler than I'd hoped and I was wondering if you all had some advice on where to go from here. I feel the skin came out a little too flat in some places, almost bordering on an undead look; I feel it could use a little more color, possibly some blush or other elements to give the skin a bit more life. Any advice on next steps or opinions on where you would take such a piece?

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[Bailey03]

I think Reaper has some nice skin tones, but I tend to go beyond just using the triad. The skin shadows aren't quite dark enough for me so I'll add a reddish brown to the mix. You can try a dark red instead, that can work well for the cheeks, but I prefer a reddish brown. I like the rosy shadow and basic skin tone, from there I transition into their fair skin shades. Depending on the figure I might add in a touch of pure white for some final highlights. This will still give you a light looking skin, though I feel like that is okay for female figures, children, and cartoony characters like this one.
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I've also used their bronze skin and tanned skin colors for different looks. I wrote up a tutorial on skin tones which goes into more depth. This might be helpful to you...
http://www.wampforum.com/VB4/content.php?r=3623-Painting-Skin-Tones

The pictures you posted are very small, so it's hard to say what you should do with your figure. One thing might be to apply the shadows to a larger area. If you leave too much in mid tones and highlights it makes the whole thing look lighter. Keep your highlights on the top of the cheeks and nose, but quickly transition to shadows as you move to the lower portion of that rounded face. Do similar things with the rest of the body.

The face is very round, so you can almost treat it like a sphere. Doing a quick google search for 'shading sphere' and I grabbed this image. You can see that even with light highlights it looks dark because it quickly transitions to the midtones and then shadows. So apply those rosy highlights sparingly, cover more area in the rosy shadow, and perhaps try to mix in a reddish brown or dark red to give the shadows a little more weight.
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Hope that helps!

 

[airhead]

Mintfish, the first two pics are not of much use. Too washed out by the camera. Unfortunately, photos are what we've got to work with.

The last pic looks ok for that cartoony style mini. But if you want to exagerate the shadows, I think it would look much more realistic. Reaper has 3 triads of fleshtones. I've been known to use most of them trying to get a larger mini (Sophie) to look right. Someone here gave me some advice a long time ago (thanks Mike). Think of stage makeup with the harsh lights, you have to exaggerate the contrast. Normally you'd see from shadow to mid tone to highlight |--|--|, but you've got to spread the constrast out. Paint from darker to even lighter - but not to white in most cases. More like this: |-----|-----|.
Hope that helps.

 

[MintFish]

I have a bit of a beginners question here. I reapplied the shadows mixing brown with the rosy shadow for the first layer and working my up to Rosy Skin. I'm not quite sure if I should be brushing towards the shadows or away from the shadows; I usually just use washes to shade and brush away from the shadows to create highlights. This method is what achieved the overly pale look I got before. In this instance, I brushed towards the shadows but doing so seems to have obtained an overly sharp transition that makes her look like she's growing a beard. Simply put, which direction should I be brushing in?

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[airhead]

Transition is too rapid and not all in the right spots. The dark should be under the chin, at the nose juncture and under the lip. The mid tone should be carried much further down the face with the highlight on the cheekbones and bridge of the nose. Put some shadown under the hair on the forehead, but not much. In the articles section, there are a few on faces. Dragonsreach has an excellent one on expressions. Well worth a read.

 

[TrystanGST]

I'm certainly not at Bailey's level, but I just did this step-by-step over on the Reaper forums specifically on faces.
http://www.reapermini.com/forum/index.php?/topic/52823-step-by-step-face-for-seoni-iconic-sorceress/

 

[Bailey03]

I like the shadows under the chin, but I'd take the midtone down the cheeks to about the middle or bottom of the mouth. As for brush direction, when you're painting with a darker color, brush towards the shadows, with a lighter brush towards the highlights.

Trystan, never underestimate the benefits of working on a figure twice the size of those little 28s!

 

[MintFish]

So after some more work I've obtained the following results, which I'm much happier with. Again, not the best photo quality, but I think it gives a good impression. I might work a little more on her back, but I think the natural shadows of her head compliment them well enough that I can leave them alone. Thanks to everyone for the advice and some great resources.
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[Wombat85]

Looks good, maybe its the photo but the paint is looking a little thick.

 

[Chrispy]

First off, it looks like you're doing swell on your own! Second, I'll just leave this link here. Third- when doing SD/ Cartoony figures, you kinda get a "pass" because of the rounded nature of the figure. Too much shading or highlights makes it look funky, but you can also try doing cell shading. Anyhoo- keep up the good work!