-- Robert Leyland (temet nosce)

Paints
Bestial Brown
Dwarf Flesh
Elf Flesh
Skull White
Enchanted Blue

Inks
Flesh Wash

Intro

In this guide I will attempt to describe how to paint a face that looks great. For my example I will use Weathertop Aragorn. It is pretty much essential to use a fine detail brush when painting faces, so do so.

Step 1

First give the face a basecoat with bestial brown, trying to avoid the eyes.

Step 2

Then give the face a layer of slightly watered down dwarf flesh and layering it up until there is a solid colour. This way there should not be too much paint on the face. Also try to leave some bestial brown in the deepest recesses.

Step 3

Mix together a mix of dwarf flesh and elf flesh in equal quantities then slightly water this down again. Then layer this onto the face onto the higher points of the face to make it look like the normal face with some shading at the edges of the face and in the deep recesses of the face such as just below and at the sides of the nose.

Step 4

I then gave the face a very watered down wash of flesh ink all over the face, this was to give it a bit of warmth and to blend the colours together a bit better.

Step 5

I then gave the high points of the face such as his cheeks and nose a highlight with elf flesh.

Step 6

I then dipped my brush in some skull white paint making sure I had a very little amount on the tip of the brush. I then brushed this over the eye of the model. I repeat until there is a solid white colour on the eye. I try to be extra careful to not get white on the face. (if you have worries about this then you could paint the eye earlier and not have to worry about the face, but you will have to worry about the eye when painting the face. It swings and roundabouts if you get what I mean ;). I then get some enchanted blue and dip my brush in, again making sure I have as little on my brush as possible and put a dot in the eye. Try to make it look realistic so for example in the Aragorn pose his head is turned facing the right so try to place the pupils looking slightly to the right.

Step 7

If the model has any facial hair paint this on now and then paint the lips with dwarf flesh. The face should now be complete.

Examples

Here are a few more examples of faces I have painted this way:

Robert Leyland (temet nosce)
robertleyland@hotmail.com

---

Please take a moment to give the writer of this article some feedback on their work!
The link below will allow you to rate and leave a comment for this article.

Rate & Comment Here!

---