My next baby was selected by popular choice over on the Bountiful Baby forum: Faith. Faith is a delicate looking newborn/preemie. She has the thin limbs and face of a preemie, but at 16" she is just about the size of a small full-term baby. Rather than setting out with a skintone in mind, I am going to begin Faith and just see where she takes me.
First step is a cool vein mottle. I get this color form combining BB Vein Blue, UM Blue, and Phthalo Blue 02. I applied it thinly as this shade of blue comes through strongly. I apply it as a mottle, a crease color, and as preliminary blue shading. The left photo shows her in a Cree daylight bulb, the right photo is a warm white LED, and the center photo is with both on.
The next layer to go on is "Dirty Purple." This is originally a color I got from watching Custom Doll Baby's Kim on YouTube. I have used this color since I began reborning, but now I have my own recipe: BB Eyelid Purple + a small amount of Burnt Umber until I get a color that reminds me of raisins. I apply Dirty Purple as a mottle, crease, and shade for the inner ear and eyelid.
Next is my "Indigo" layer: Macpherson's Interal Wash + touch of UM Blue + touch of Burnt Umber. I have used the Internal Wash by itself before, but I like the slight graying of the blue that I get with a touch of Burnt Umber. I have notices that a slight duskiness adds to the realism of of the baby when you are planning to work in high color.
The baby looks a little corpse-like at this point, which tells me that I am on track. Since I look at painting as building the skin from the inside out, this is the perfect "bloodless" color. Luckily, the next color is "Blood Red." I make this color by adding touches of several others. I play with it until it looks like fresh arterial blood, so I do not have an exact recipe. The colors that I usually use are Pyrrole Red 02, Q.Crimson 01, Burnt Umber, and a bit of leftover Indigo. With this layer, she is looking much more alive. Consequently, I also think that she is looking more like a he.
Next I add a little opacity to the skin with a Flesh 07 speck mottle. This is a technique that I learned off of Melissa George's patreon. What I like about it is that it increases depth majorly and allows the next set of speck washes to be truly on top of the under-painting. The Flesh speck mottle does not really change the color of the baby, so there is not much difference in photos between the last step and this one. If anything, he just looks a little more blended. At this point, I am not happy with how pale the backs of the hands are. I have noticed a tendency towards pale hands lately and I am going to try to correct that in later layers.
If you are doing a budget baby or a reborn that you know will be loved well by a child or elderly person, you can stop here and move on to detailing. In my next WIP post, I will be doing a series of speck washes, then I will begin the overtones of the skin, then detailing. Happy reborning and thanks for following along!