Painting lips on Male Headsculpts?

Hi - all. I have a major problem painting lips/mouths on male headsculpts. Every time I try it ends up looking to thick and dark and even often like lipstick. What COLOR is best recommended for lips on male figures. I can't for the life of me ever get it right. Also what is the best technique for blending it so it gradually fades to the skin under and about the lips and not just a sharp line of paint (again looking like lipstick)? Any help would be so appreciated!!

I'm not an expert but I water down red paint and wash it on the lips. It usually comes out to my liking.

I use a watered down mixture of red, blue, and white with maybe a touch a black. Then adjust the proportions to get the color I want.

It depends on the skintone, but a flesh colour + red + brown will do for me!

Hmmm...well this explains it then. I have been using shades of pink and it just doesn't look good. Thanks guys! I will definitely try these suggestions!!!

I udo a base coat of flesh and do all my shading with ground up chalk pastels. I mix red and brown chalk and brush it on then dull cote it. Good colour no sharp lines.

paint the lips and then dry bush skin tone over em

Same as thainer, I apply a bit of red and orange (chalk pastel) then you use a bit of water to spread the paint. The good thing about pastel is you can always fix it or make the tones more lighter with a bit of water.

joebiwan said:

Hmmm...well this explains it then. I have been using shades of pink and it just doesn't look good. Thanks guys! I will definitely try these suggestions!!!

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Yeah, I fell for that too. Turns out that lips are a mix of red and grey (not white).
My minimal experience says don't too afraid of wasting a bit of paint...can be tempting to put a tiny bit on your pallette and try and use that, but often it takes quite a bit of mixing to get the right tone/shade. If you're using matchhead sized bits of paint, there's not enough to experiment with.

Never tried pastels, might try it.

necronomicon said:

It depends on the skintone, but a flesh colour + red + brown will do for me!

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I've also learned the hard way theres no one size fits all and alot of it depends on what skin tone you're bringing out. Google vallejo model face painting or somethign similar, theres quite a few sites that have color by color guides to build up whatever tones you're looking for, basically cheat guides until you get your own rhythm down.

As other have said i use pastels too very easy to work with!

One that I have found that goes well with most caucasian skin tones is Rosy Shadow from Reaper minature paints. You can add colors and darken or lighten it as needed.

Burnt sienna + white + cadmium red + touch of ultramarine. I've been using this mixture for years.

How I do it is I paint a rose color on the lips then take
Rusty brown pastel apply some to a flat paint brush dab the lips then blend
With a clean brush works perfet