painting black hair

[GAR]

HOWDY. So I am practicing working out my black hair to get a very rich deep color.

I have done a little bit with some blues and greys, tried a little with browns but so far I am not getting the depth of color or the \"feel\" I want.

I have also played around a little with touches of white, but it is just not looking quite right.

I wonder if anyone has any suggestions or maybe I am just trying to hard for what I think I should have.

Also, I maybe should stop watching the shampoo and conditioner commericals cause allthey do is just depress me.

Do they make Suave for minis??

Thanks

 

[stefanhws]

May you can show some pictures then i can tell you what you did wrong.

there is no secret. So take blue grey and brown is the right way. If you paint black don\'t use real black always mix it with some other colour. I always highlight up to whight to show the refelxion of the hair.

Cheers Stefan

 

[Beefy]

i paint black hair with black mixed with codex grey and work up from there and when i get it quite light i water down some black ink put that over the top and wipe away most of it so it only goes in the gaps in the hair (if any) and then i also do another highlight of the previous mix before the ink hope this helps a bit.

 

[lahatiel]

Two current threads from the Reaper forum might be useful to you:

A) A thread on this very question with some good explanations and theories in response:

http://www.reapermini.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=27896&st=0&start=0

B) Reaper\'s head painter, Anne Foerster, started a WIP thread last week in which she\'s doing an illustrated step-by-step on her current model, which has black hair. This link goes to page 2 of the thread, as she starts talking about the hair about 3/4 down the page, and it continues onto the next page:

http://www.reapermini.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=27923&st=15

Hope this helps.

 

[GAR]

Wow, thanks all.

I will post my figure so you can look it over and give me some feedback on it. Although I will probably do it over in the submissions section as that is I think the better place for review and critque.

many thanks!
GAR

 

[GAR]

OK so I finally got around to taking some pictures of my mini. I am not really happy with the way it turned out, and the picture quality is not all there either.

But still, I think it is a reasonable enough picture to show what I am talking about. I have not had a chance to try out some of the techniques suggested, but any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Much Thanks!!

 

[ipaintminis]

I think what you\'re dealing with could be solved by a few simple touches. At least for me.


In the back to give her hair some dimention try less white and place it in more dramatic places, like the crest of the curves in her pony tail instead of all down the length of her hair. The brightest of whites would only be in the very very tippy-top of the strand of hair.

When I do black hair, I tend to put one light coat of black on the entire hair, thne the whites on the top of each highlight point and then go through with either greys or browns, although in your case I\'d go brown because of the red dress. and wash thin coats (like 3) of the brown. Then I reapply the white to a smaller area of the top of each highlight. Lastly I go through with a black wash (thicker than usual but still a wash) all over the entire hair to bring back the richness of the black.


I hope that helps a little bit! and I still wish they made suave for minis!


You might want to look into using Magic Wash for your minis, as a side note, it helps to smooth out the paint. you can learn about it HERE if you havent heard about it yet.