Quick eye painting demo

[daremo]

I know a lot of people hate painting eyes, especially when it comes to cast heads. Here's how I paint my eyes.

1. Paint the eye white/gloss white/light gray

2. Paint a thin black line along the top of the eye

3. Dot (needs to be round) the iris/pupil with black paint towards the top of the eye leaving a little bit of white showing below (not enough white will look surprised and too much will look passed out/dead).

4. Clean up around the eye with flesh color or use an exacto to scrape the paint away if it's a cast (I paint the eyes first).

 

[jlw515]

Thanks for this tutorial! My attempts at painting eyes have been horrible, except for one custom using a custom Wookie resin head sculpt. I've got several custom head sculpts I acquired in a parts lot. I just need to take the time and practice on them. I'm sure it's one of those practice makes perfect things.

Jason

 

[SnakeEater]

great tutorial. eyes are the trickiest no doubt. its amazing how a wonky eyed figure basically ruins the whole thing - and a well painted set of eyes can make a difference

 

[Greycap]

What tool do you use to get the round iris?

 

[blackblast]

Thanks for teh tutorial, very clear

 

[Giga Bread]

Some of my tips.

1. Paint the lashes first. It's easier to get the correct eye shape if you paint your sclera over it. If the white isn't totally opaque, it can create this happy accident of a natural lid shadow.

2. Unless it's a character wearing makeup, make the lashes something other than black. If the character is blond, brown, or redhead, go with a medium to dark brown.

3. Paint the iris with two shades. And you can get creative with this but I recommend one shade being darker and grayed. This shade will be the iris, use the brighter shade for the lower part.
4. Dot the pupil with a micron but try to get it closer to the top lid.

5. You'll see people try to dot the iris with white to add a reflection. To me it doesn't look right, especially on tough characters. I'll instead use a little iridescent white from liquitex to make an eye look wet.

6. If you don't paint the flesh, you can use a scribe to sharpen the bottom outline of the eye.

7. I use nail art brushes. I can get 00 and 0000 for relatively cheap prices and I prefer the aluminum construction of the handle and the pen caps that protect the brushes. I found mine on Amazon.

8. Some eyes are on characters that are a little more squinty (Clint Eastwood for instance) Don't be afraid to address this with earth washes and just leave it. Most of our up close photos of heads are beyond our eyes' capability of making out the detail. Without magnifying glasses, you're not going to be able to focus on something that small.

And Daremo, I gotta send you some stuff. I've been distracted with some JoeCon models.

 

[Contraband]

Neat! different from how I do it,but your way seems to work!