Monday 22 February 2016

From AnneO'L-Hasslefree Moderns Dark Skin (20 points)

Finally I have completed the last two miniatures of the five figure Hasslefree Moderns team.  I like to think of them as hired assassins.

At the end of the post, I will include a walk through on how I approached a darker black skin tone.

Figures are 28mm and were sculpted by Kev White.







These figures are worth 10 points.  I have included a group shot to show the five figure team together.


To aid in the discussion about skin tones, I have included a close up shot of the females face.


All paints used were from Reaper Miniatures.  


I photographed the paints as some people do not use Reaper and may be able to find comparable colours by their favourite manufacturer.  From left to right are:  Nightshade Purple, Dark Skin Shadow, Dark Skin Base, Dark Skin Highlight, Green Ochre and Twighlight Purple.

Normally I would use Dark Skin Base as my base colour. This time however, I used Dark Skin Shadows as my base and worked into the shadows by adding increasing amounts of the Nightshade Purple until I was using pure Nightshade Purple in the deepest shadows.  

I then applied thin glazes of Dark Skin Base and worked up to Dark Skin Highlights to create two mid tones.  From there I added increasing amounts of Green Ochre to the Dark Skin Highlight until I reached the highest highlight.  For this I used pure Green Ochre.  All layers were applied as thin glazes.  Although this is time consuming, it does allow for smooth transitions as one works up such a steep gradient.  

Finally I added three thin glazes of the Twighlight Purple.  That final glazing step unifies the layers and helps to provide depth of colour.

I want to take a moment to discuss the difference between painting Caucasian skin and Black skin.  The basic principals are different with a black skin as the gradient from shadow to highlight is very steep.


This can be illustrated by looking at these paint samples.  At the top is the darkest and lightest colours for a dark Black skin and the bottom is for a warm Caucasian skin.  A fundamental difference between Dark skin and Caucasian skin is where the contrast occurs.

In Caucasian skin all the contrast occurs when going from mid tone to shadow. The transition from mid tone to highlight is subtle and is to be kept very soft.  The opposite applies to Dark Skin.  In Dark Skin, all the contrast occurs when going from the mid tone to the highlight.  The transition from mid tone to shadow is less exaggerated.  This is due to the differences in the reflection of light in the respective skin colours.


Those principals can easily be seen when looking at photographs.  Notice the depth of shadow in Cillian Murphy's face and subtle transition from mid tone to highlight.  However, when looking at Omar Epps, we see the opposite is true.  While there is little difference between mid tone and shadow, there is a great deal of contrast between the mid tone and the highlights.  

I realise this is quite wordy, but I hope that it is of help to some people when they are painting character figures.   


Anne you have done it again.  These are amazing paint jobs and bring the figures to life brilliantly.  the first figures looks like she came off the set of the Mod Squad and I wouldn't want to mess with either of them!  And don't apologise for being wordy, this is gold to the res too us.  I could later on all day, but I'll let the figures and the readers speak for themselves.  Oh and I figure one of your figures is worth at least two of mine and have awarded points accordingly! 

27 comments:

  1. Great stuff and a great tutorial on dark skin tones. I like the running fellow makes me think of "Hawk" from the old Spencer book and TV series.

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  2. Really, really well done Anne. Excellent work. And thanks for the tutorial and tips! Always nice to see how the pros do it :)

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  3. Stunning work as always Anne, and a very useful tutorial for dark skin tones :)

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  4. Forget the skin tones*, we need a tutorial on that gorgeous yellow on that afro girl's pants!

    Awesome work

    *ok, ok. Skin tones is pretty good too ;-)

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    1. Those yellows took 6 different paint colours to achieve. It was horror and took longer than the skin on both figures. I hated doing it!

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    2. Of course it was! It's yellow, the bane of painters everywhere. But I do love a good yellow, yours is great.

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  5. Stunning. All hail the mighty o'leary

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  6. Brilliant work Anne. And the explanation in Skin tone highlights is useful ...and simple illustrated ... Well done .

    I have tagged this for Sarah's Choice too..

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    1. I'm hoping to see lannick's frog's get Sarah's Choice this year.

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  7. Stonking work Anne. I love the lady in the yellow bell-bottoms. Fabulous tutorial as well as well, but I don't think I could sustain this process for a series of large wargames units (without being committed to a mental facility). But for individual command stands, very helpful.

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    1. Most definitely wouldn't be worth the time on large wargaming units. I'm not using it on my British paras-not with all the webbing to paint. No way!

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  8. They are stunning, love the girls slacks, you rule this style my friend

    Ian

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  9. I add my voice to my fellow painters, Anne you are master painter!
    I find your tutorial "artistic", a friend of mine who is professional painter uses the same style of techniques on her canvas paintings, Congratulations!

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    1. The best tutorials out there are done by people who paint on canvas. They really understand light and colour theory.

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  10. Thank you all for your kind words!

    @Peter-thank you for the extra points! You're a doll!

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  11. Superb work. Love the bright colour contrast on the yellow pants. Top work as usual. cheers

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  12. Superb work. Love the bright colour contrast on the yellow pants. Top work as usual. cheers

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  13. Anne, you have an absolutely amazing skill with both brush and camera. Your figures shouldn't count two, they should count five!

    Stunning work, and a great tutorial on painting.

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  14. Amazing work Anne! You've really nailed the darker skintone!

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  15. Great tutorial! The afro lady is superb!

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  16. Absolutely amazing and the tutorial was quite informative.

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  17. Very fine work, Anne! Exquisitely done! ;)

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  18. Fab work Anne! I really appreciate your guide for dark skin tones. Something I'm always struggling with.

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