28mm faces and other shadows

[Andy in Germany]

so, I'm working on my first set of figures for 28mm pulp gaming. They are coming out okay, but faces are giving me trouble.

Most of the time I've got passable results with a black or dark grey wash, and I managed a slight improvement by adding a drop of black ink, but I can't get a consistent result. One one face the wash behaves and goes into all the right crevices,on the next it either runs off, or blobs under the meniscus, or makes the whole face grey. I can generally make it do what I want after a couple of attempts but it is frustrating.

After looking at the images here I tried a brown/flesh mix in place of the black I was using which is an improvement: again it stained the whole face, but this time the figure looked simply sun burnt instead of undead. The features are nice and clear though.

I went and tried the same on the next figure and it didn't work, same wash, same brush: the only difference was the second figure has a statuesque head and the first was a North Star pulp.

So how do other people do this? I see some great details in the faces of other 28mm figures and I'm wondering what I'm missing. I wondered if breaking the surface tension would work to help the wash flow where it should. Any suggestions?

[robh]

Breaking the surface tension will help. Guidelines for using washes are:

Thin colour, you can always do 2 or 3 applications if you want darker effect.
Use finest grade inks you can afford (W&N etc) as the pigment is more finely ground and colours more evenly.
Spot varnish the face first (Vallejo brush on gloss or satin is ideal) to prevent the ink staining the areas you do not want shaded.
Use a thinner medium (Liquin or Vallejo matt medium) and pure water not tap water.
Be prepared to lift excess wash off the surface with a clean brush. Using a wash is more challenging than just slop on and forget.

[Andy in Germany]

Thanks, that makes a lot of sense.It would probably make sense to mix up a batch for a wash once I've worked out the right formula.

How would you break the surface tension? on a Model Railway we often use a spot of washing up liquid, but I don't know if that would work for the much smaller quantities involved here.

[Keith]

Tbh I wash the face only as a base to painting everything on top.
To keep it simple you can wash the face (definitely using a brown) and touch in the skin around the details again with a brush and the base colour. This way you don't need to worry too much about the quality of your wash and everything looks consistent.

[robh]

How would you break the surface tension? on a Model Railway we often use a spot of washing up liquid, but I don't know if that would work for the much smaller quantities involved here.

It does work but has to be minute quantities and mixed  in the water before you make the wash rather than afterwards. Unfortunately it tends to leave a hard to kill shine to the ink as it dries. Windsor and Newton sell a bottle of "Flow Improver" in their acrylics range which is excellent. A bottle will last a lifetime for the kind of work we do.

[Charlie_]

My technique for flesh is a dark brown basecoat, followed by a dark tan / flesh coat leaving the brown in the creases (between the lips, under the nose, eye slits, etc), then successive highlights mixing a lighter flesh colour in. Then a flesh wash over everything (I use and would recommend Vallejo Flesh Wash).

A quick tip for this technique - make your last highlight very light and contrasting with the previous layers. Before the flesh wash, it will make them look very gaunt and pallid, but the wash will darken everything back a bit and blend the layers together.
If you DON'T make your last highlight layer extreme enough, the flesh wash can potentially blend everything too much and make it look flat.

After this I can always go back and re-highlight areas, or add a dark umber wash to the creases, eyes, etc, and a light grey wash around the jaw for stubble.

[FifteensAway]

If I read the OP carefully, I believe he's trying for undead flesh which is his challenge.  Not being into that at all, I'm not going to be of much help but maybe someone can address that specific need.  Assuming I've read it right.

[Andy in Germany]

Many thanks for the suggestions and ideas, I'll be trying them out as time and college schedules permit...

If I read the OP carefully, I believe he's trying for undead flesh which is his challenge.  Not being into that at all, I'm not going to be of much help but maybe someone can address that specific need.  Assuming I've read it right.

I really need to remember I'm on a wargaming forum and not a Model Railway forum: I'm aiming for very normal flesh tones, although I can see how my post gave the impression I was after zombies. Apologies.