Another latex mask paint up.

Hey RPFers!

I had one more latex blank from the very talented Francisco Charlie Hernandez and wanted to do something a bit out of my comfort zone. Jordu Schell does these absolutely gorgeous green flesh tones and this is my love letter to those paint schemes.
Unfortunately with a move to LA coming in a month or so, I didn't really stop to take photos along the way. Just wanted to sit down and get it done.
I started by giving the whole mask a coat of green PAX paint, and then went in with some purple airbrushing for wrinkles, blues for shadows, and then have the whole piece a few spatter passes for break-up.

This is when the experimentation and mistakes happened.. I tried to do a pattern with a darker green -- Webbing that slowly shifted towards the front of the head. Well, I wasn't too happy with that so I tried to go over it a bit with an even darker green. No dice.. tried to lighten it back up and do spots. Even worse. Eventually, I ended up just blacking out the areas.. or blueing out more accurately, and then doing a black pattern with white highlighting over that.


This is where it was after that whole menagerie of errors. It basically looks like he is wearing a cowl or swim cap. Completely unnatural and just plain weird.



I took a trip to Georgia over the weekend to celebrate my sisters wedding, and it gave me some time away from the piece to rethink the paint job.
I ended up taking a white and doing the webbing I was going for initially over the blue areas. I then tinted the whole blue area and face with a green, and went over the back of the head with a brownish green. Did some more work on the face and tried to tie everything more together to feel a bit more natural...

Here it is after the updates




I still need to gloss the eyes and make some horns but I'm very happy with it now. I think if I were to completely repaint the piece I could improve in a lot of areas, but I'm not altogether unpleased with the results.
A quick before and after. Really a huge difference.



If I could leave you with one thought, it would be this... Don't be afraid to mess up. Don't be afraid to ruin something, and for gods sake don't be afraid to have FUN! Just go for it folks.. and enjoy the craft.

thats insane!
why no comments peeps?

I agree, looks awesome. Only thing id add, and you may have already done so, is epoxy on the eyes and maybe a little in the mouth. Well done

I am sick of all you guys talent :darnkids

Great work as usual, I dont know how I didnt pick up on this thread sooner. So aside from the PAX, what other paint did you use? I cant believe thats a latex mask. Looks awesome.

ChuckyAPP, thank you! I havent actually glossed them yet. I was packing up for a move while I did this and I already packed up my epoxy! I'll have to make horns and gloss the eyes down the road.

Snikt said:

Great work as usual, I dont know how I didnt pick up on this thread sooner. So aside from the PAX, what other paint did you use? I cant believe thats a latex mask. Looks awesome.

Click to expand...

I am a thread posting Ninja. :ninja

Thank you Snikt! :lol
Paint was Tim Gore's Bloodline. I am planning on picking up Createx's Wicked line of colors soon to do more bright and fun characters, but Bloodline is usually the go-to for me.
I have a whole line of masks sketched up. Dying to get my hands on some WED. Think this time next year I'll have a lot to show and hopefully I'll have time to do a full in depth write up on some stuff. I owe it to the RPF.

This is great! Maybe you can help me with a problem I'm having with painting foam latex:

My paint job is super sticky, even days later. I followed the tips on stan winston school which are:

Rubber cement base
Paint layers (oil/rubber cement/paint thinner)
Rubber cement sealer

It's been days since I've finsihed painting the foam latex pieces and it's all STILL sticky; to the point that the latex pieces can't be moved at all lest they stick to themselves and ruin the paint job/foam.

Sure, I can try and help. First off, when you say sticky, what do you mean? The pieces are sticky to the touch, (tacky?) or are they sticking to each other?

If the pieces are tacky, as if the rubber cement hasn't dried, you could have used too much oil paint in the mix. I'm afraid I wouldn't really know what to do in this case other than letting the oils dry. You could maybe try some baby powder or talc light patted in to absorb the oils?

If is just sticking to itself, you can use translucent setting powder or baby powder, and then hit it with V-Matt, V-Gloss, or any Liquitex Clear Varnish.
I try to avoid RCP if I can these days, but Liquitex Matte Medium is usually what I would seal stuff with and it removed the sticking issues.

Really hope this helps!

FuzzyDrawings said:

This is great! Maybe you can help me with a problem I'm having with painting foam latex:

My paint job is super sticky, even days later. I followed the tips on stan winston school which are:

Rubber cement base
Paint layers (oil/rubber cement/paint thinner)
Rubber cement sealer

It's been days since I've finsihed painting the foam latex pieces and it's all STILL sticky; to the point that the latex pieces can't be moved at all lest they stick to themselves and ruin the paint job/foam.

Click to expand...

Thanks! I used some baby powder and that REALLY helped. But yeah, I think the problem was just too much oil paint in the mix. Thanks again!