How I Make Fleshtone

Linda Friedman has asked what inks I used to make the flesh tones on my Diva piece, so I'm going to address that in this post. The first thing I need to say is the inks I list below are for Caucasian skin. I am in the process of making a series of art quilts depicting people doing something that to me says "attitude". When I paint someone with other skin tones I will state in this blog what inks I have used to get that skin tone. But, here are the Tsukeniko inks I used for the Diva piece:

Skin tones not in shadow:
95 - Tuscan Beige
92 - Red Delicious
53 - Autumn Leaf



I mixed these three colors together in differing ratios until I get the shade I am after.  As usual, I mix the inks with aloe vera gel. I create lights, mediums and darks (redder tones) from these three and apply them based on the appearance that I am trying to achieve. They give me a yellow to red color, depending on the amount of each ink. I use the photo of the person as my guide to help me decide what color to paint an area.

The colors listed above are good for the skin that is not in shadow. I will paint the entire body part with the shade I create from the three colors, and then I mix together a "shade" color.

The colors that are used to make "shaded flesh tones" are those listed above plus:

19 - Cerulean Blue
62 - Midnight



These are mixed with the flesh tones at times, and at other times I will use the Cerulean on top of the skin tone colors after they have dried. .

If I was trying to create an olive skin tone I would probably use a green instead of a blue for my shadow color.

I hope this is not too confusing, but I make various shades of a yellow/red tone and add blues to make them darker for the shadow areas. Feel free to ask another question if you have one. I'll do my best to answer your question.

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Hands, Arms and Feet

Just as I showed in my last post, I painted the hands, arms and feet on white fabric using Tsukeniko inks and Aloe Vera gel.



Here you see them close to finished.

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The Face of a Diva!

I mentioned in my last post that I use my enlarged drawing as a pattern template. Here you see the enlarged drawing on my light pad, with white fabric laid over it. I traced the outlines of the head, arms and feet on the white fabric so that I could paint them.





Here is the face painting in progress. I used Tsukeniko paints with Aloe Vera gel to do the painting on the fabric. The gel gives me a lot of control over the flow of the paints. they can still bleed with the gel, and sometimes I have to use a hair dryer to dry an area quickly to prevent it from flowing into the adjacent location. But the gel makes the painting technique like using oil paints, but still gives the look of a watercolor.





Here is the face a little further along:




I still need to add some dark shading to the top of the head and a little more shadow on the face near the left side of the nose, but you can get the idea. I think her lips need a little more pink color too, hmm....

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New Project - Diva in the Making!

Shannon

This is a picture of one of my nieces, Shannon. She was about 3 or 4 years old, I think, in this picture. I have always loved it - her posture, the over-sized glasses, the cool jeans and belt, and her feet that still have baby fat on them!

So my next project is to make a fiber art piece based on this photograph. I did a line drawing tracing from the photograph, and then I enlarged this line drawing to my desired finished size, which is about 25 inches high.

line drawing

enlarged drawing

The enlarged drawing is what I use for patterns for the fabrics for my art quilts. I'll show more of that in the next few posts. Thanks for visiting my blog!

Mergansers!

I go on a fishing trip every year to the North Umpqua River in Oregon. It is one of the most beautiful places on the planet, in my opinion. There are mergansers on the river, and  I see them on the water or flying  by when I am fishing. They are wonderful to watch and I look forward to seeing them every year.

This is a watercolor painting I did from a photo of the mergansers on the river.

Mergansers by Eileen Wintemute