Acrylic Color PEACH FLESH

A peach tone for the lightest places of a face

Peach Flesh is a light flesh with the pinkish-orange hint that skin has in the places where it is lit the most. It is rarely used as the only color of a face. Its strength is the last step of a transition: with it, on finished skin, you pull out the cheekbones, the bridge of the nose, the chin, the knuckles and the upper side of the ears, that is the points that tell the eye where the light is coming from.

The shade stays warm even after lightening, so a face does not turn gray, as happens when brightening with white. The build-up usually looks like this: the base flesh, a brown or red dark shade into the folds, a return of the base color onto the areas and finally thin strokes of this tone. Anyone who wants the transition even finer mixes it with the base flesh as they go, in a ratio that shifts with every coat.

What to watch out for

• take only a small drop onto the tip of the brush, an excess breaks the soft transition
• a light pigment needs clean water, otherwise the tone goes cloudy
• for an airbrush thin it with acrylic thinner and spray in thin veils
• close the bottle at once, light shades thicken in the air the fastest

The paint is suited to work outside figures too. On the fine areas of models it serves as a base under cream and ivory tones, because it is dense and does not let a dark base through. It dries matte, so further coats follow on it without trouble.

One more note about light. A brightening is always to have one direction, otherwise it flattens a face. Before you reach for the brush, think over where the sun shines on the character from, and keep to it on the face, on the hands and on the equipment.