What color is skin color?
How does an artist know which colored pencils to use when portraying a human face?
This post shows the method I’ve invented for myself.
1
With my reference photo open in Photoshop, I sample colors in various places on the face. Those are the squares you see directly on Cheri’s face. That is a separate layer in Photoshop, overlaying the photo, which I can switch on and off.
After I’ve made all those color swatches on her face, I copy that layer and move it over to the left of her face (keeping all the swatches in the same configuration as on the face). Now it’s on the neutral grey that is the same color as the paper as I’m working on. That allows me to really see what color pencils I’ll need and how those colors will look on the grey paper.
That’s my “map” of the colors on Cheri’s face.
The pink ones in the center are her lips.
And the “white” one in the center of those is her teeth color. (It’s actually a pale cream.)
These colors are unique to Cheri’s face. The swatches for Larry’s face will be a little different.
2
Looking at the swatches I made in Photoshop on my monitor, I pick out my pencil colors to match them. I make these charts of swatches with those pencils on scraps of the same paper I’m working on (“Felt Grey” Canson Mi-Teintes) with the pencil names, to guide me in picking up the right color while I’m working.
These are the colors I’ll use when working on the skin of Cheri’s face.
The last 4 colors on the right-hand scrap are the colors I’ll use for Cheri’s hazel eyes.
For each portrait I create, these swatches-scraps for that particular portrait will be unique to that portrait.
3
In the studio:
My “map” of skin-colors is on the monitor to the left of Cheri’s photo. The pencil colors I’m using are on a piece of clean white paper directly above the part of the artwork I’m working on, where I can grab them quickly. My swatches-scraps, a reference for which pencil to grab, are next to the pencils.
Pencil sharpener to the right, drafting brush to the left. All my tools near to hand where I can use them quickly. Clean white paper covers the artwork except the part I’m working on.
4
Cheri's forehead and eyebrows finished, and working my way down the cheeks and nose.
The swatches I sampled with Photoshop to see accurate colors are a “crutch”, a tool to help the artist. An artist who develops an eye for color can pull out the correct pencils to use, without Photoshop. I did for years, and still can. But sometimes the colors in a face will surprise you.
Double portrait of Cheri McNealy and her beloved late husband Larry McNealy, in progress.
🎨 Prismacolor pencil on grey Canson Mi-Teintes paper, 20 x 24 inches.
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