Painting Men's Faces

[Ong]

I'm painting two 1/35 men's faces...Evolution Miniatures's 1/35 Stalkers. The sculptor did an amazing job on the faces and the flesh I added looks great.

My questions are...should one shade and highlight 1/35 men's faces? I read that women's faces usually lack shades and shadows for 1/35 scale, hence 1/35 women's faces should be mostly flesh tone. However, that article said that 1/35 men's faces have more stark features and angular and hence should be shaded with contrasting flesh tones. I'm wondering if not shading 1/35 men's faces might pass them off as being younger or not give them a masculine look. The 1/35 face is so small (and one has a beard) that I'm wondering if it's even necessary to bother with shades and shadows for the flesh.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Alex]

any scale should be shaded and highlighted. otherwise the paint job will look flat.
actually, you should shade and highlight MORE 1:35 figures than 120 mm figures
between men and women, the only difference, if we are talking of people of same age, is that you should aim for butter smooth transitions for women.

 

[housecarl]

Links to articles here.
There's also loads on You Tube.

 

[Bailey]

Yeah, Alex is definitely right. 1/35 scale should definitely be shaded, both men's and women's faces. Typically I will try for softer shading on a female figure, with the smaller lines and details much more subtle than on a male face. Here's an example 1/35 female I've painted recently. You can see there's shading and highlighting on the face.

If you're interested, here's a step by step I wrote on painting faces. The primary example is a 1/35 scale male face, so it should hopefully be helpful for you.
http://powellminipainting.blogspot.com/p/painting-faces-step-by-step.html

 

[Ong]

Great info! Thanks, guys!

 

[Ferris]

As much as I agree with previous posts there are different styles with different levels of contrast. For example, Toshihiro Sano has a very low contrast style when painting faces, but the result is still highly realistic. I recently purchased one of his 1/35 figures and can say this based on personal observation.
If you search for his name on the forum you will find examples.

Ultimately your own preference counts, of course.

Cheers,
Adrian

 

[Mirofsoft]

Yeah, Alex is definitely right. 1/35 scale should definitely be shaded, both men's and women's faces. Typically I will try for softer shading on a female figure, with the smaller lines and details much more subtle than on a male face. Here's an example 1/35 female I've painted recently. You can see there's shading and highlighting on the face.


If you're interested, here's a step by step I wrote on painting faces. The primary example is a 1/35 scale male face, so it should hopefully be helpful for you.
http://powellminipainting.blogspot.com/p/painting-faces-step-by-step.html

Superb shading and pespective