Skintones

[Eveningkiss]

Comeing up with a good skin tone is always a challenge for me. The people always come out too white or too orange. Can anyone give me any tips on making good skin tones with either oil or acrylics? None of the books i have (and i have alot) really discuss how to do "proper" skin tones.

[fishw]

it all depends on the light, so close observation from life is the answer really. this diagram can be helpful to remember too.
http://www.studioproducts.com/demo/images/headstud.jpg

[Magic Man]

it all depends on the light, so close observation from life is the answer really. this diagram can be helpful to remember too.

^

Nuff said.

[Steinmetz]

you start with white and then you add reds or oranges etc depending on how the light hits the picture and then use pure white for the highlights. That's how the master, Steinmetz does it, baby~

[AndreasM]

you start with white and then you add reds or oranges etc depending on how the light hits the picture and then use pure white for the highlights. That's how the master, Steinmetz does it, baby~
You're starting to annoy me..

Eveningkiss, if you have a hard time coming up with good skintones, I suggest you alot of studies. You have a mirror, don't you? Try doing a 40+ hour masterstudy of one of the many Bouguereau paintings as well.

Heh, I don't know shit about skintones, but as far as i know...more study=more win!

[Magic Man]

You're starting to annoy me..

Just starting?

[AndreasM]

Well, I can stand his general idioticy, but that level of arrogance displayed here kind of tickles my angry button.

[Main Loop]

you start with white and then you add reds or oranges etc depending on how the light hits the picture and then use pure white for the highlights. That's how the master, Steinmetz does it, baby~


highlights are never pure white.. light always has a color, and hightlights always have a bit of that color influencing them

[Tully]

Linda Bergkvist made a nice little summary of her thoughts on the subject.
http://www.furiae.com/gallery/tutorials/skintones.jpg If you follow it to the letter it works best for whiteish lighting, but I've found it to be quite helpful.

n0fish is quite right that a master study of one of bouguereau's paintings would be immensely helpful. I did a quick one (too quick...I need to do another) of his Portrait of Gabrielle Cot (which you can find a high resolution version of on www.artrenewal.org) and it helped me see a lot of things I'd been missing before.

[DavePalumbo]

you start with white and then you add reds or oranges etc depending on how the light hits the picture and then use pure white for the highlights

highlights are never pure white

can I disagree with both of you? will that make any sense? One of the key things about skin tone is that it is 100% relative to its environment, and there is not formula to achieve the proper results. I assume you're speaking of caucasian skin tones, which are the trickiest in my opinion because they can vary wildly depending on light, surroundings, even the temperature of the room that the model is posing in. So really the only way to learn is practice practice practice and train your eye to distinguish subtle colors without inserting colors that don't exist.

But some general tips.

White is a valuable color, but it must be used properly. When you load up all your colors with white to brighten them, you tend to get a chalky dead effect. Beautiful pure colors have little if any white, so try to use it only when nescessary.

The caucasian skin tone is simply a combination of refections of the light around it and penetration of the colors beneath it. This is why you can have green tones and pink tones on the same hand or foot or face and they will look completely believable. Generally speaking, the joints tend to be more "transparent" and show alot of pinks and reds, the center of the body tends to be more pale. This is something you should really examine extensively until you feel you know the paterns of the human figure.

Value is the real key, color is secondary. If your values are correct, you can get away with faulty colors (sometimes)

Warm shadows generally work with cool lights, cool shadows with warm lights.

some examples of colorful skin tones:

http://www.imaginistix.com/details.cfm?Id=376
http://www.ulster.net/~jonesart/moonandvenus.jpg
http://frazetta.ragnarok.no/images/cg.jpg
http://doriansportraits.com/Misc_Images&Pages/_05_Self-Portrait_NJ.jpg

[Steinmetz]

White is a valuable color, but it must be used properly. When you load up all your colors with white to brighten them, you tend to get a chalky dead effect. Beautiful pure colors have little if any white, so try to use it only when nescessary.
Good points dave, but using white with other colours isn't such a bad thing considering the oilings and varnishes that you can use to bring the colours out again.

I think the hardest skin tones to figure out are the ones in shadow. Without just slapping pure colours on like brown or black.

[DavePalumbo]

Overuse of the white is one of the most often made mistakes of people new to oil paint in my experience. It's certainly useful in the lighter areas of skintones, but you still have to be careful.

For a good long while, my brother used practically no white at all in his paintings, shifting to Naples Yellow for his lightest shades. He would only add some Titanium, if any, at the very end in his peak highlights. I think this was from that period: http://www.artistshouse.com/images/art/_E/art2073_E.jpg
I was perpetualy baffled by the range he could achieve without white, or any prismatics either for that matter.

If you learn to master your basic pigments, you can go unbelievably far with them.

[Elwell]

Be aware that most "naples yellow" you'll find today is really a variation on yellow ochre and/or cad yellow + white.
Color and pigment are different. White paint doesn't equal "lightness" just as black paint doesn't equal "darkness". Keeping a hue true while darkening and lightening it ("holding the local") is rarely a matter of simply adding black or white. And that's not even dealing with the color of the light or the surroundings. One mistake I see lot of people make when starting is to try to mix the local color, then darken and lighten it, rather than identifying and mixing the different colors they see in the light, halftone, and shadow separately.

[Steinmetz]

Overuse of the white is one of the most often made mistakes of people new to oil paint in my experience. It's certainly useful in the lighter areas of skintones, but you still have to be careful.

For a good long while, my brother used practically no white at all in his paintings, shifting to Naples Yellow for his lightest shades. He would only add some Titanium, if any, at the very end in his peak highlights. I think this was from that period: http://www.artistshouse.com/images/art/_E/art2073_E.jpg
I was perpetualy baffled by the range he could achieve without white, or any prismatics either for that matter.

If you learn to master your basic pigments, you can go unbelievably far with them.
I might have a go at this idea of yours tommorow, of course if your theory is correct having a limited palette and trying to get tones for a face without using white, would make it difficult to do. Right?

[DavePalumbo]

all things are relative in the finite world of your canvas. You decide what the lightest light and darkest dark will be and as long as things are proportionate, it should work out. It will have a different quality more than likely, but you may like it better.

just checked the pigments, indeed the Naples Yellow does have Zinc and Titanium in it. Regardless, the point was mix in moderation. I see guys go at the white like it's candy and their colors turn ashen and muddy in no time.

[Blue]

i'm gonna save that diagram. Fairly useful imho :)

[Elwell]

i'm gonna save that diagram. Fairly useful imho :)

Credit where credit is due, it's by Rob Howard, who runs things over at the Studio Products (http://forums.studioproducts.com) forums.

[cotron]

hey Steinmetz, why don't you actually post some of your shit rather than talking so much of it? I don't think I've seen anything but little half-done pencil sketches from you. Where are these illustrious oil paintings you're talking about?

[Steinmetz]

Cotron this thread isn't about me.
Personally I'm more interested in seing some of DavePalumbo's work, than satisfying your needs. But Dave you don't have a link/.

[Quicksilver]

Cotron this thread isn't about me.
Personally I'm more interested in seing some of DavePalumbo's work, than satisfying your needs. But Dave you don't have a link/.
Look at his profile. :P He's awesome~

[Steinmetz]

Wow he is good. After having a look, Dave give us some more tips!

[DavePalumbo]

thankyou both, nothing more is coming to mind at the moment though.

[Steinmetz]

You could open your own teaching thread here in the lounge

Also how much do your subject paintings sell for on average? I'm looking to start a career in oil painting one of these days..