Dorcas Designs

This tutorial is an easy one: Creating African hair textures with Prismacolor pencils.

I am using:

I am starting off with an allover light layer of Rosy Beige (below). 

It looks rather pinkish at this point.

Then I add some Sienna Brown to the areas that will have the most shadow. We want the hair to "poof"

I am using tight circular motions with my pencil. (And no blending solution)

Then I go in and work the shadows a bit more with the Dark Brown.

And go over the highlighted area with the Beige.

It's looking rather light at this point so I am going to go back and another layer of the Sienna Brown .

(Below)

And to finish, some more Dark Brown.

For this hair type, you want to keep your pencil strokes. It gives the illusion of tight curls.

Looking Good!

That's it!

and a finished image:

Hi There!

Below you will find the tools you need to create a multicultural skin tone on your images.

This isn't a dark African tone, its kind of a mixed tone which is quite pretty.

And by the way I'm quite  new at coloring non-white images so bear with me as I have not perfected it, this is just what I do and if it is helpful to you, so much the better!

These are the pencils I have used: (Prismacolors)

I start off by laying down a soft layer of Rosy Beige

On top of that, I add Jasmine (below)

Then Peach (below)

And Goldenrod (below)

Then a layer of Blush Pink, applying a little heavier around the areas I want shaded (the hairline, neck etc)

(Below)

Then the same thing with Pink (below)

And now for another  layer of Goldenrod. (particularly in your shadows)

Then go in with the Rosy Beige and pretty much give it an all over. Rosy Beige is good for melding the colors together and keeping the tone.

(below)

Now for a bit of Burnt Ochre just in the shadows. Don't overdo it.

And Dark Brown (VERY lightly in shadows)

(Below)

And some Clay Rose 

It's at this point that I see that I would like a bit of blush in her cheeks so I go back in with the Pink and lightly work some pink pigment into her cheeks. It's not too much cos lets face it, darker skin tones don't blush like us whities. :-)

And I finsh it off with a bit of Mineral Orange to tone it all out.

That's it!

 I could go in with more of the darker pencils we used to make a darker skin tone but I'm liking this just fine so I'll stop here. :-)