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This is something I hadn't really applied any thought to previously - I'm currently painting a very wide spectrum of skin tones for one army - what washes are best to use for, well, non caucasian flesh tones?

What colours do I need to make my colours look naturally shaded, if I'm doing a quick wash-splash, three tone, tabletop standard?

I guess I'm looking for people to look like people and not like wood, paper or leather, so I'm checking first.

these are the colours I'm working with (I suspect Flesh 3&4 are for blushing and lips/cheeks}

Using those paints that are laying down (I can't quite make out the pots) I would probably use the following mixes to get different tones (it's all going to be custom colours, because the tones are a bit odd). That said they are pretty basic mixes/methods for skin tones, if you want to get more complex you need to be using red, yellow and purple washes (sometimes blue) in varying degrees.

Any way onto the cheap nasty mixes that will get you by

Caucasian

- Mix 50:50 Brown 1 and Flesh 3,
- Wash with something that has a red/brown base like Reikland Flesh from GW
- Relayer the original mix
- Highlight Flesh 3

Pale Caucasian

- Basecoat Flesh 2
- Wash with Red/brown like Reikland flesh (this needs to be super light, you don't want to go heavy, should almost be a glaze)
- Relayer Flesh 2
- Highlight 50:50 Flesh 2 and Flesh 1

Asian (This all hinges on the Flesh 2 colour, it looks like a creamish colour, so it should have a slight yellow to it)

- Mix 50:50 Flesh 2 and Flesh 3 (although I have a feeling you will need to adjust the ratio to include more Flesh 2)
- Wash with something that is Yellow/brown, a sepia will probably work
- Relayer the original mix
- Highlight with flesh 2

I'd also experiment with a yellow glaze at the end. It should be super dilute, and used fairly sparingly.

African American - I stylise this as a more dark brown rather than black colour

- Basecoat with Brown 4
- Layer with a 50:50 mix of Brown 4 and Brown 3
- Highlight with Brown 3

I myself wouldn't use a wash, you could and if you wanted to just use a dark brown, but I would rely on the basecoat doing the shading.

Black

- Basecoat Brown 5
- Wash with Black
- Relayer Brown 5
- Highlight with 50:50 mix of Brown 5 and Brown 4

I'd also probably tone back this highlight, add a bit more Brown 5, use something like 70:30.

Woah, thanks so much fella! It's really appreciated. I can't tell browns and greens and blue apart very well, which is why I'm struggling.

Sorry about the lousy explanation of my paints there - If you click for the full image, each figure is using the "Shade" tone of the triad they're stood in front of. The purplish edge to 126A is pretty nice, and goes on very well.

Disappointingly, Brown 1 is a very, very odd paint when out of the bottle, it's actually orange. And the rest of the WarColours are similarly alarming when out. Mixing does get nice results though. And at least with skin tones it never has to be exactly replicated.

I probably should have tried to do this with easier paints like Citadel, rather than testing out a new shiny purchase, I've got 85 infantry to get done this way.

(Gotta laugh at myself - I had a real "..?" moment with your Asian paint recommendation because being in the UK, I tend to think South Asia by default)

 Buttery Commissar wrote:
Woah, thanks so much fella! It's really appreciated. I can't tell browns and greens and blue apart very well, which is why I'm struggling.

Sorry about the lousy explanation of my paints there - If you click for the full image, each figure is using the "Shade" tone of the triad they're stood in front of. The purplish edge to 126A is pretty nice, and goes on very well.

Disappointingly, Brown 1 is a very, very odd paint when out of the bottle, it's actually orange. And the rest of the WarColours are similarly alarming when out. Mixing does get nice results though. And at least with skin tones it never has to be exactly replicated.

No problems at all, I had a bit of time to kill and it didn't take too long to figure it out.

So am I right in understanding that the two painted figures were painted with the 6 foundry paints at the back? As in the left most three painted the left most figure, and the same goes for the right? Or you have only used the single paint that happens to be called a "shade".

I don't mind the foundry paint colours, their triads will work well enough, if you use the base, then wash, rebase and then use the highlight colour. If you stick with the mixes I mentioned above you could probably sub the South American Light for the Brown 1, it has the same kind of tone but might be a bit less orange. If you want to stick with using Brown 1, you could try adding a bit tiny bit (I absolutely mean a tiny bit) of a medium blue colour if you have one, it should pull the orange out of it a bit.

Yes. Sorry, "A" of each triad is labelled as a Shade. I've only done the base colour on those two figures so far due to time.*
I quite like African Flesh shade, but the South American is not how I pictured it. Might be my eyes, but it looks sort of Disney cartoon colour to me.

I quite like Foundry, but they're a sod to get hold of (I shouldn't complain being that I actually live in the same region).

Thanks so much, I'll have a crack at this in daylight tomorrow (today?), and hopefully end up with something that looks like people.
I'm not super thrilled with the job I'm doing with these, I've never done 'tabletop' before, and it's grating. Time crunch, though. I can always come back and gussy up. I can't however, enter the tourney with bare metal.

*Long story short, I'm working over that green you can see, due to being an idiot and not masking properly. It's taken a lot of time thus far to get those bases down with thin layers.