Bailey
A Fixture
I normally tend towards fantasy and historical subjects, but every so often I like to shake things up. I recently got this Neko Galaxy kit from a friend and it felt like the right time to start painting her. I'm been focusing on improving my use of light (ambient light color, primary light color, and cast shadows) on my last few pieces and am using this project to continue that effort. I also want to continue to improve my work on skin, so I've focused on that as well. In particular, here I've tried to create a semi-shiny skin with light reflections painted on.
For anyone interested, the skin was done with Reaper paints: 50/50 Rosy Shadow and Fair Skin for the base. A mix of Ruddy Leather, Imperial Purple, Rosy Shadow (2:1:1) + a touch of Void Blue for the shadows. More rosy shadow was gradually mixed in (intermediate layers) until I was at pure Rosy Shadow. Then I started to add Fair Skin. At ~50/50 Fair Skin and Rosy shadow I started to add in a 2:1 mix of Lemon Yellow and Linen White. Reflection points where done by adding Pure White to the Lemon Yellow/Linen White mix (though with some of the base skin tone mixed in as well, rather than pure Lemon Yellow/Linen White). Red was added to the shadow and midtones in spots like the nose, cheeks, and knees and then combinations of that variant version was mixed with the primary skin to smooth out the transitions (still a work in progress on the knees btw).
In my opinion, the specific paints/brand is less important than the choices of colors. To the shadows, you can add blue for a typical outdoor ambient light. In this case, I wanted more of a violet ambiance, so I used purple and blue. Work up to regular skin tones. Then pick a highlight color that matches the color of the primary light source, in this case yellow. Since skin can be a light shade, make sure you don't add your highlight color too late. It needs to also make the color lighter and not just shift the shade. Hence I started to introduce the yellow at 50/50 Rosy Shadow and Fair Skin rather than just pure Fair Skin. You can work in color variation, like more red, directly into the mix or through the use of glazes. But try to keep your top highlights the same since the same light is hitting the nose, cheeks, and knees that is hitting the rest of the body. And on top of all of that, I use plenty of intermediate layers and thinned paints for the transitions.
For anyone interested, the skin was done with Reaper paints: 50/50 Rosy Shadow and Fair Skin for the base. A mix of Ruddy Leather, Imperial Purple, Rosy Shadow (2:1:1) + a touch of Void Blue for the shadows. More rosy shadow was gradually mixed in (intermediate layers) until I was at pure Rosy Shadow. Then I started to add Fair Skin. At ~50/50 Fair Skin and Rosy shadow I started to add in a 2:1 mix of Lemon Yellow and Linen White. Reflection points where done by adding Pure White to the Lemon Yellow/Linen White mix (though with some of the base skin tone mixed in as well, rather than pure Lemon Yellow/Linen White). Red was added to the shadow and midtones in spots like the nose, cheeks, and knees and then combinations of that variant version was mixed with the primary skin to smooth out the transitions (still a work in progress on the knees btw).
In my opinion, the specific paints/brand is less important than the choices of colors. To the shadows, you can add blue for a typical outdoor ambient light. In this case, I wanted more of a violet ambiance, so I used purple and blue. Work up to regular skin tones. Then pick a highlight color that matches the color of the primary light source, in this case yellow. Since skin can be a light shade, make sure you don't add your highlight color too late. It needs to also make the color lighter and not just shift the shade. Hence I started to introduce the yellow at 50/50 Rosy Shadow and Fair Skin rather than just pure Fair Skin. You can work in color variation, like more red, directly into the mix or through the use of glazes. But try to keep your top highlights the same since the same light is hitting the nose, cheeks, and knees that is hitting the rest of the body. And on top of all of that, I use plenty of intermediate layers and thinned paints for the transitions.
