5 Tips For Painting Skin Tones for Portraits in Watercolor

have you ever tried painting portrait using watercolors but just got stumped trying to figure out what colors to use for the skin well in today's video want to remove the mystery surrounding skin tones and break it down into five simple steps for those of you who don't know me my name is Emily and if you're new to my channel I'm committed to helping you create watercolor paintings you can be proud of also know that most of you who are watching my video right now are not subscribed so it's totally free just subscribe right now and you'll be the first to know anytime release new video alright my first tip for helping you nail those skin tones and watercolor is to Swatch your colors first so that you can see the full range of values values are how light or dark your colors are so I've swatched five of my favorite colors for skin tones use gamboge Nova transparent orange burnt sienna quinacridone Rose and ultramarine blue although these colors certainly aren't the only colors you can use for skin I've discovered you can match just about any skin tone using just these five colors when you Swatch your colors you can observe how they look at their darkest and their lightest values you'll find that the white values tend to be most useful when you're painting areas of skin that are in the light and your dark values are going to really come in handy when you're painting areas in Shadow now two other useful paint qualities that you might take note of while studying your colors are transparency and granulation in my opinion fully transparent paints look the best when you're painting skin when first started with watercolors was using colors on the skin that were semi-transparent like yellow ocher burnt Umber and indigo and discovered that using these colors especially in the shadows and layering over and over it made the skin look really murky and overworked so test your colors for transparency by painting over black Sharpie line granulating paints are paints that create pebbly or Sandy separation of the pigment when they're activated with the water both front Sienna and ultramarine blue are granulating pigments and actually love the way that looks in skin granulation can give the skin this effortless texture and it just looks really cool but if you prefer smoother look maybe for painting children or babies you might want to choose colors that do not granulate my second tip is to create color mixing chart this will help you see how your colors play together now if you're still confused by color mixing it is such good idea to create color mixing chart this will really help jump start your knowledge of what your paints are capable of and it gives you an at glance resource for easily replicating any of the mixes on your chart to create chart for my five skin tone colors used pencil and ruler to make 5x5 inch square divided into equal one inch squares where the x-axis meets the y-axis paint that combination of colors so that you'll have the pure unmixed colors running along at diagonal and two-tone mixes above and below for the top portion of your chart mix 50 50 mixture at dark value so that means adding only enough water to make the paint workable and buttery and then for the bottom portion of your chart water down your mix as much as possible so that you can see what the colors look like when they're did when you're all finished you'll have much better understanding of how your colors work together and great reference for helping you compare and choose colors for your next portrait painting my third tip is to start with your lightest tone and work light to dark really study your reference photo take good look at it and try to describe yourself what the lightest color is is it yellow is it red is it pink is it orange this can be tricky if the highlights in the portrait are surrounded by darker or more prominent colors in this portrait of medium skin toned little girl could actually see cool or more bluish highlights in her skin so for my lightest first layer chose tinted wash of ultramarine blue to capture those cool highlights from there you can begin to layer Colors Over the Top which leads me to my next tip use wet and wet now since there are so many subtle smooth transitions between colors and values in skin wet and wet will be your best friend for creating those seamless Blends for each of these skin tone studies started with clean water before adding tinted washes for this one started with my tinted wash of ultramarine and since the model skin is very orangey it's kind of this warm reddish brown my next layer was wash of transparent orange which painted wet and wet you can see how this technique allows for super soft transitions from light to dark and you can push and pull the paint quite bit while it's still wet so that it looks smooth and even while that mid-tone layer of orange was still wet dropped in some pure burnt sienna to match the more reddish tones in the little girl's cheeks as long as you keep your brush loaded with paint and no excess water you can just keep layering color on in this way getting darker and darker in the shadow areas now sometimes you may reach point where your painting has already begun to dry in this case let it dry completely or you can use the heat tool to speed up the process if you try to go in when it's beginning to dry you run the risk of accidentally lifting paint from your previous layers so let it dry all the way all right my last tip is to test each color before applying it to your painting it's good idea to have test sheet or scrap piece of paper to try out your colors on before applying them to your painting this will help you adjust your color mixes and values ahead of time so you don't make the mistake of going in too dark or too chromatic with color on your painting definitely made sure to test my ultramarine blue on scrap piece of paper before going into my painting this color needed to be dark enough to suggest the cool shadow on the model's left cheek and since ultramarine blue and burnt sienna neutralize each other which knew because created color mixing chart knew could safely paint this over the layer of burnt sienna to create that dark grayish Brown Shadow without it looking too blue or gaudy now ultimately there is no substitute for practice when it comes to understanding skin tones but hopefully these tips were helpful all eight of these skin tone sphere exercises are available in real time through my watercolor Mastery membership so if you want to watch the whole process step by step and paint along with me head over to emilyolsonart.com with your membership you'll have complete access to this skin tones course along with over hundred real-time fully narrated tutorials each tutorial comes with downloadable reference photo line drawings and complete list of supplies used in each video I'll leave link in the description below so you guys can check that out thanks so much for joining me today check out these other videos all about painting portraits and watercolor and I'll see you there