Aesthetics Face up journey

I just started getting into BJDs about a month ago. I was intrigued by the possibilities BJDs offer, especially the painting part. So I ordered a Doll Family practice head (just 20$ which I think was a steal given how wonderful the head looks ) and a few materials. I thought it would be nice to document my progress (I hope there will be progress xD) and at the same time talk about things I discovered and issues I came across. I also want to talk about materials - most of the stuff I use is standard, except for some minor deviations.

So first of all, a brief look at the nude head (white, MSD sized):



I really like how the head-cap is so neatly attached - it fits perfectly and isn't bigger than the head base (as I have seen on some other heads) - so thats great !

On to the materials:

• Liquitex Matte Varnish (UV Cut) as a primer and sealant (it is a whole lot less toxic than MSC and easy to obtain in Germany) - the German name is: Liquitex Spray Firnis matt, 400 ml
  
• Respiratory protection category A2P3
• Schmincke Soft Pastels (you don't need to grind them, they're so soft, that you simply dab your brush into the pastel sticks and you're good to go)
• Faber Castell Watercolor Pencils and Derwent Watercolor Pencils (Inktense)
• Cotton gloves in white
• Some tissues to clean my brushes/get rid of excess water
• A tiny cup of water for cleaning the brushes and wetting the watercolor pencils
  
• A bunch of brushes, fluffy, firm etc
• After my failed attempt, I wiped the head easily using cotton pads and Q-tips that I dipped in biological brush-cleaner

What I learned:

• Give the primer time to dry. The backside of the primer I used said: Let it dry for 12 hours - well I didn't (let it dry for ~1 hour) which was a mistake
• You need a bit of space on your desk to spread out the materials and all the afore mentioned stuff
• Be extremely careful when trying to get rid of smudges, before you know it you will have messed up the faceup xD
• I used the biological brush cleaner when I tried to get a smudge off the faceup and i think that was a mistake... Took the primer right off and left me with an unprimed resin surface
• You'll need a lot of cotton pads and Q-tips
• Blow off excess pastel powder
• Plan out what you intend to do. I thought "I'll just wing it" but that only ended in confusion in regard to what to do next. I will watch some tutorials, how people proceed and pick a faceup I like for reference - so at least I got a rough idea, what I am going for
• I was confused at first which Pastel colors to get - going to an actual store and seeing all the colors for myself (rather than an online color chart) helped a lot
• I might be wrong, but water and pastel sticks don't seem to mix well, or I simply didn't handle it right, but for now I'll avoid doing that
• I blushed first, did not re-seal (because I wanted to wipe the faceup anyway, so sealing it again did not seem feasible) and then started with watercolor pencils right on tip of the blushing... Not a great idea xD - make sure to seal pastel layers once you're done before continuing. Also this time I'll try it the other way around: First apply watercolor pencils and then go in there with the pastels after it's all dry (if I use water)
• I should use a better camera next time, the pictures are awfully blurry OTL

My first attempt:

So this is my first attempt at a face up ever (never done anything like it, but its a lot of fun now that I tried!) so a lot of things went wrong and I had no real concept what to do, something I will watch out for once I go for my second attempt:



The left side is okay-ish but the right side (viewers perspective) is a horrible mess - here a bit of a closer view on the right side that shows off where I messed around with the brush cleaner on the face:



So yeah, that didn't go so well xD. Looking forward to my next attempt though, and I was surprised that the eyebrows were not as difficult as I anticipated (granted, they don't look all that good xD).

Looking forward to feedback or maybe your own face up stories !

 

I gather you've been doing this for a while - I'd love to see your works, do you have pictures anywhere ? Any tips you can give me ? I actually have one question (ok, three xD) I could not really find an answer to yet:

1. If I misstep with the pastels, how can I "erase" them? Using water dabs seems to affect the sealant and the pastels in a messy way, using dry Q-tips or cotton pads doesn't really do much, so I am a bit at a loss how to fix those mishaps
2. If I mess up with dry watercolor pencils an eraser should do the trick I guess? I am worried to smudge the whole thing to hell xD so I only very carefully used an eraser but it doesn't seem to work all that well >.<
3. How about wet watercolor pencil lines? Would using dry Q-tips/cotton pads repair the damage? I guess an eraser would create a mess here xD ?

Originally the only purpose of the head was practice xD .But after receiving the head and really liking it, I am seriously considering it, getting a body for him/her (so far the head is fairly neutral and could be either gender I guess) however I got a little elf boy coming in the next 2-3 weeks (hopefully) so the next thing I will try on the practice head, is a to attempt a faceup I could use on my elf boy ! But I do expect to wipe the head a few more times before coming up with anything acceptable .

Thank you so much for your comment and if you got any tips or see any mistakes I should look out for, please feel free to let me know !

To avoid a double post, I'll proceed straight with my update :

I just finished the second face up attempt on the doll head. Again a few mishaps, but nothing as dire as the messed up face-half yesterday. However I did have some issues:

• When priming the head this morning apparently some dust particle got stuck in the coating - I just realized now and of course it was right next to the nose - so I took on an advice I read somewhere and turned the dust particle into a mole/beauty patch and in order to avoid confusion I added a second one, so it's clear what that brown dot is supposed to be xD
• It seemed I did not prime the head evenly, some places had more sealant on it than others which lead to some issues with pastel color distribution on the chin, the tip of the nose and that thing between mouth and nose (I don't even know what it's called in my language lol)
• I drew the eyelines with a watercolor pencil but was afraid to add water, worried I might mess up the pastel base (as I hadn't sealed in between) xD - any recommendations on when to seal and how often to seal between layers is more than welcome - especially tips regarding what to start with (Blushing? Lines?) and whether it's better to use pastel atop watercolor pencils or the other way around etc

Now without further ado - the documentation of my second face up (this time with a better camera - but some pics without flash, resulting in graininess OTL - lesson learned)





Cheers !

 

@yumi~ Oh wow thank you sooo much for your tips, this will be a huge help!! I just read your entire face up thread, great work there !! I tried to find a button to move the thread to the critique forum, but I could not find anything? I guess I need to contact a mod for that purpose ?

@Wismur thank you so much for your words of encouragement and I wish you all the best for your face up journey and I am looking forward to your works !

 

Goodnight everyone and I am back with my third attempt :] ! @yumi~ thank you sooo much again for all the advice - it was worth it's weight in gold during my third run !

What I did and learned this time around...

• This time I started out with the eyebrow shape using pastels (light) - I actually messed up right at the start, and remembered Yumi's advice about how to remove unwanted pastels - the kneaded eraser worked awesomely well :] ! I carefully dabbed it on the place i wanted to rid of the pastel
  
• I ditched bright red for a slight orange blush around the nose/below the lips
• Then I moved on to the lips, this time I tried something new: I outlined the lip shape, I was hoping this way it would be easier for me to end up with a defined lip-form which sort of worked - or at least I felt less confused this time around while painting the lips xD
• After the outlines, i dabbed the lips in a very light rose color, gradually increasing the intensity
• rose color was also applied to the space between the upper eyelid and the eyebrows as well as the cheeks
• I started blushing the eyes, starting with a light orange color, but picking Zinnoberrot (bright red, almost a little pinkish) for the inner eye corners (where the tear ducts are)
• I picked light brown for the eyelid and tried to darken it on the outer corners a bit
• My next mistake happened when I drew the lower eyelids - i messed up pretty bad but managed (thank you yumi!!) to fix it using Q-tips with a bit of water.
• This was also the first time I put a second layer of Liquitex xD - I usually avoid it, because I wipe the face up anyway right after I am done, but this time I wanted to try using gloss for the lips and tear ducts, so I sprayed another sealing layer, waited 30 minutes and then took a tiny flat brush, dabbed it into Tamiya Acryl-Lack X-22 (a clear, acryllic gloss) and applied it to the lips. However I only noticed after it had dried, that you really need to be careful with it: I applied it to the entire lips, but not good enough, so some parts of the lips shine and some (the sides) don't which looks a bit weird and is very noticeable
• Same for the tear ducts, I did not really have a plan on how to apply it and it got a little out of hand xD

And here the third face up result - thanks you so much for all your help and tips!! I'll try to get some new colors, as I feel my palette is currently way to heavy on red xD

 

Thank you so much for your words of encouragement and the tip with the eyeliner ! I also felt the colors were a litte less distinguished around the eyes - basically a mix of reds xD. and bringing something darker into the mix would have helped the face up a lot : ) ! I also need to extend my pastel palette more as I feel I am missing darker tones (especially brown, black and oranges) and I also feel like I adding something like purple or blue/green would make the whole thing look more interesting and generally offer a wider range of possibilities ! Thank you so much again, I hope I can post a new face up soon and continuously improve and learn new things :] !!


Small Update:

Today I received two wigs I ordered for a Doll Leaves Wish (he has been shipped today !) since the head size matches my practice head I went ahead and tried both wigs on. The head is quite versatile and could easily pass as a boy I think :] .

This is the black wig M-1096 Mild black from ForMyDoll:



And this is the brownish wig GW45-014a from Dollzone:



Nightly Update:

I tried another faceup today but oh boy this did not go well xD. It started with the sealant: I kinda messed up the priming but did not notice until later. The goal was to work on something simple, but with strong, dark lines, especially around the eyes.

• I first noticed that the primer wasn't done properly, when trying to base color the lips - parts of the inner lips did not pick up color (or at least not easily) and I felt the smooth resin surface while messing around with the brush
• Since I did not want to re-seal I decided to put the focus on the eyes/eyebrows. Which leads to the first issue: The eyebrows are too far up and kinda odd looking, too mechanical and bushy >.<
• I used wet watercolor and a brush to paint the part around the eyes dark but It was really hard to use a brush, rather than a pencil, so the eyes are not very similar in regard to the eyeliner (or anything at all really lol)
• Next mess up was the lower eyelids, uuuh this looked odd, because I had used black watercolor that was very strong and then drew in the lower eyelashes with black (but dry) watercolor pencils. That was just too big of a contrast and looked really odd. I tried to cover it up with some dark brown shading under the eyes with very limited success xD
• The next huge mistake was the part between the eyebrows and the upper eyelid - you can see the pastel application is not even, instead you see lots of tiny grains. I am not sure how this happened, but I am guessing, it's related to the poorly applied primer and an unclean brush, which surprised me with a color much darker than what I had anticipated
• Overall I'll file this one under "fail" xD - but trying out using a brush in combination with watercolor at least gave me the chance to try this out and be a little more confident about it on my next attempt :] !

Have a great weekend everyone !

 

Oh wow good points !! I just compared to the other attempts, where the eyebrows did not look so weird and I realized, I tried so hard to give her a different expression (with the eyebrows) that I fell into the trap you mentioned: I ignored the sculpt and made them way too straight xD )

I had been considering it - but not sure how to go about it? I was thinking: cardboard-paper (or anything else thats durable) and an X-Acto knife to cut out the shape? Though I am guessing one would need multiple templates for different shape faces?

That reminds me, I had some more questions xD ...

More questions @ everyone

1. I feel to make really strong lines I'll eventually need some kind of liquid paint - I was thinking Watercolor paint or Acrylics - but I am not sure if one is better/more suited than the other?
2. Do I always need a thinner when working with Acrylics?
3. Any tips on how to paint really thin lower eyelashes? I have a very thin brush, but there seems to be more to it, than just the brush size. As the lines I made with that brush looked horrible, and I am sure it's because I handled the brush in a wrong way xD
4. After cleaning the entire head with brush cleaner, should I wipe it with water as well? I did that yesterday and I wondered if it partly had a negative effect on the Primer I sprayed on afterwards (I dried the head with a tissue)...

Thank you so much everyone and have a great weekend !

 

Thanks a bunch for the extensive instructions :] !! One question: I am guessing the problem with moisturized soap is that it contains oil? As a dish soap I use "Pril" but I got no idea if it could be harmful in any way to resin. I'll try it on a small patch of the head cap first !

Thanks a bunch for the suggestions regarding eyebrows !! Awesome idea with searching the web for pictures of different depicted emotions ! As for the art supplies: I live in Berlin/Germany, so there are a lot of great art supply shops around here . I really love Schmincke pastels, so I think I'll give their acrylic line a shot as well. Other than that we got a few well stocked online stores as well, so finding acrylics and maybe trying out different ones should be a breeze .

Thank you so much for the instructions! It didn't even occur to me, to use painter's tape but it seems an awesome way, as the shape will adjust to the head - thanks a bunch !

Lastly one more question:

• Does anyone have experience with using watercolors? What are the pro/cons regarding watercolors? Thanks a bunch in advance !

Cheers & thank you all so much for your help!
Milenn

 

Thank you so much !! And thank you so much for the warning regarding water colors!! I borrowed watercolors and acrylics from a friend today - so I'll try both and see how they compare. The acrylics she has are thinned with water afaik - so this would make it a tad easier. And I mostly just need them for eyelining etc. so I won't have to mix colors - hopefully xD.

A few hours later...

Ok this is my first attempt using water based colors (gouache I think?) on the left (close up in second pic) side and acrylics (close up in the third pic) on the right side of the eye (directions from a viewer's perspective):



Applying the gouache (in Germany it's sold as water-based colors I got no idea if the correct English term is "gouache" or something else) was a lot easier and the color seems more vivid/evenly spread than the acrylics. But I still need to practice a lot, as my lines aren't that good. However after this experience I think I will go with the water-based color for a bit and see how it goes. If I experience the same issues that @yumi~ mentioned I might switch to acrylics though.

Thanks everyone and good night !

 

Hello everyone!

I got some new pastels today and I thought I'd try something purple for a change . I also I got Faber Castell "Pitt artist pen" which I applied on the inside of my practice head, just to make check, if it can be removed again. I'll post an update here on those pens and whether they work without staining the resin permanently, that would be awesome, because they got brushes that allow you to make very thin lines and are easy to handle :] ! The pens are water-based and I talked with a person at the art supply shop and he indicated, it should be possible to remove them with regular brush cleaner which is also used for removing acrylics etc.

Without further ado, here is the 7th face up attempt:



Her lips got a bit messed up >.< and blushing her nose is always an issue - there are distinct lines there that are darker than other places on the nose and its new impossible to erase them. First I thought I sprayed the sealant unevenly but I am not so sure anymore and I wonder if it's related to the sculpt... If that is unlikely it's probably an issue with how I spray the sealant.

Some more things I want to try/have learned:

• The gouache and acrylics I used for the eyeliner on my last 6th face up both came off easily
• Since acrylics seem to be a better fit, based on what @yumi~ mentioned I want to give them another try and got acrylics from two different brands for that purpose
• I sprayed my Doll Leaves 42cm boy body today with Liquitex Matte Varnish and it is pretty difficult to spray a still assembled body completely xD - but I am currently too afraid to disassemble him, so we'll see how that goes
• Doll Leaves Wish will not only receive body blushing (my first attempt at it) but I am also currently working on a better face up for him, something a little darker than before, but not too dark

UPDATE 08.02.2016

So I completed the body blushing (Doll Leaves Wish, MSD sized Boy body):



What I learned

• Even if it's painful - disassemble the body for body blushing and prime each piece individually! I didn't and it was a major disaster xD - had a hard time spraying him evenly and actually failed, so he has blobs of primer on his feet ~_~ and the side of his legs plus a bunch of dust particles, despite keeping him in a box to dry
• The blushing itself was actually not that hard on the assembled body, but I guess its much better to keep the body disassembled until you are completely done with priming, blushing and sealing
• I did not dare to seal him - I just took some pictures and will probably wipe him clean and re-attempt this feat, once I am confident enough to restring him (which I am not at the moment OAO)

I also wanted to give the little guy a new face up - failed at the first attempt, with the acrylics (though that was entirely my fault - shaky hands <.<) and tried again - without lining his eyes:



I did mess up his right cheek (blushing) - I think I should have sealed it more than once after finishing the base layer.

Mostly for fun I also gave the Doll Family A floating head a new face up - this time something slightly different:



It was very fun, trying to do something different with her mouth this time :] !

Some more things I learned

• Acrylics are actually awesome! I just really mishandled them the first time and this time around I got artist grade acrylics which were much smoother and easily mixed with a tiny bit of water
• The Acrylics were smooth, consistent in color and looked really nice - however I messed up with my shaky hands, which is why I did not post that face up xD
• The Faber Castell PITT artist pens actually worked! I tried them on the inside of a sealed head, removed them after a day and they came off without problems. Now I'd still be careful about actually using them (the B brush is great though!), as I have no idea, what long-term effects they may have on the resin.

Cheers everyone!

 

It's been a while and the weather kind of kept me from using the sealant for face ups, but finally I found an alternative so here are two new face ups.

1. A redo of the Doll Family A head's faceup. I am not happy with it at all ~_~ - the look just doesn't appeal to me, and I am almost sorry I wiped her previous faceup OTL. I'll try again soon, just dreading having to clean her head all over again >.<



And my Doll Leaves MSD Wish also got a new Faceup and I finally completed his Link costume - again not 100% happy, I noticed with him I am sort of stuck and always somehow end up with a similar faceup ~_~



Have a great week everyone !

 

Dear yumi, thank you so much for your words of encouragement !! Interesting that you noticed the blushing - i wasn't sure about it at first xD. First I left the nose white, then I added WAY too much blushing, and then i toned it down with a kneaded eraser until it was a lot less prominent ^^.

About Wish's lips: I accidentally overpainted a little bit, so his mouth now looks a bit wider than it actually is xD. He has such thin lips originally :C !

Once again thank you so much and I'll see what I can do about the Doll Family A head - maybe I'll just modify it and if that fails start over - it's a practice head after all . I also got a Freddy-2 head lying around (with horns) and I just dread trying a faceup on him. He is such a beautiful sculpt and I am afraid to mess it up xD .

 

Hey guys !

It's been a while xD but I finally have two new faceups - first my Yo-SD Doll Chateau Merlin:



And I finally dared to give my Dollzone Freddy-2 a faceup as well xD. The horns scared the heck out of me, but I subtly colored them, nothing too fancy:



I put gloss on his lips, teeth and the upper eyelids. I really like his sculpt, so I tried to keep a minimal faceup .

Have a great week everyone,
Milenn