IONIC Dead Pink

A faded pink with no life in it

Dead Pink is not the cheerful pink of a cake shop. The manufacturer placed it among the lavender and blue tones, and the shade matches that. It is grayish, cool and stripped of saturation, as if the blood had drained out of it. That is exactly why it was created, that is for painting skin which is no longer alive, and for places where a chill should show.

What it suits

Its basic use is on the undead, vampires, the drowned and pale characters, where it serves as a brightening of gray-green flesh tones. It proves itself just as well on scar tissue, on the insides of mouths and on mucous membranes, because the cool undertone keeps the detail from looking like a plastic toy. Modelers of vehicles take it for weathered pink markings, where the red pigment has broken down in the sun.

How to work with it

The shade is so muted that it will sink into a dark surface unless you put a lighter base under it. It looks best in two or three thin coats applied over gray. It is thinned with water or with the manufacturer's product and goes through an airbrush without trouble. Wet, it looks richer than once dry, so compare the shade on a dry sample rather than straight from the bottle.

Combinations that have proved themselves

Paired with a gray-green it makes a flesh tone that looks cold and unhealthy without sliding into comic-book green. With ocher, by contrast, it gives a tone for old tissue and parchment. On scars, a thin line with the tip of the brush is enough, with the edge blended out with a damp brush tip so that it does not look like a drawn line.