Another two heads

Why it’s all about bald heads these days? Another two baby heads are on my shelf!! They are arrived, my two boys, Raine and Tray, Bountiful baby thank you! Now they both look just like box full of heads, limbs, eyes and hair, but I m so looking forward to turn it all into two gorgeous boys. I actually wanted to make two little sisters out of Raine and Tray kits, but when I looked at them closely I realised they are 100 % little guys. 

They both are pink, a bit too pink IMO (no wonder peach colour kits are usually sold much faster). But I am actually looking forward to working with pink vinyl; pink is a very natural colour to our skin. It will definitely need a bit of green wash, but otherwise it adds depth to the reborn baby skin texture, with further skin tone layers. I would do an internal purple wash to peach colored vinyl anyway, otherwise it would look too “flat”… So there are no reasons left not to like pink vinyl I guess?  ;-O

I absolutely love Secrist’s translucent vinyl. It looks odd when you look at it first, too bright for baby doll features, but once you have completed internal purple wash, it looks absolutely transformed and ready for blushing.

Two heads, dozen of limbs...

.. that's what I sculpted so far, hoping to make triplets.. the third triplet was going to be a sleeping one, and I already sculpted all limbs.. It was 3 months ago, and since then two heads and dozen of limbs are just standing on a shelf, (in the back room, not to give heard attacks to people who would see them otherwise) :-( I ignore them, doing reborning instead.. Why I do (or DONT do) it? I don't know. But I m very keen to think that I just don't like how they look :-O

I still don't know what to do with them. I m working on another Secrist doll kit at the moment and finding it exciting enought not to go back to baby sculpting for quite a while.

Eyebrows? Easy!

I like painting eyebrows on my reborn babies. I know many artists find eyebrows to be one of the hardest parts of creating a reborn baby and I totally know why. Eyebrows form and finish the look of a face.  It’s important to make them look right for the whole face to look right. Eyebrows also have to look great in promotional pictures.

I was 11 when eyebrows first took my attention, I used to draw them very often.  The first thing I would notice on somebody’s portrait would be eyebrows (in a couple of years it would be noses that I’d notice first ;-)).  So I can tell that not only reborn artists have problems with drawing them correctly.

I absolutely love the Secrist tutorial on how to draw eyebrows, especially the 3D one.  The Genesis thick medium extender does a great job adding texture and volume. (I think for young babies drawing is the only option to create eyebrows, rooted ones look too vicious.)  I will be a bit brave now when I will say that there is one mistake in the Secrist way of drawing eyebrows. On their images the eyebrows look too even. Little brush or pencil strokes go one after another, covering the eyebrow area; they seem to have same colour and same intensity. Real eyebrows never look even.

 

Those are the pictures of toddlers and young children, not baby ones, but they show the shape much clearer. As you can see, most eyebrows start in shadow at the nasal bone, where they are almost invisible and very rare and thin. Then the hair starts thicker, and they form the familiar shape of an eyebrow. Closer to the temples, the eyebrows are surrounded by thick but rare hair that form an arrow shape. Sorry for being too literal.

 

This is my latest Nicolette. Her right eyebrow, to be correct. (Please don’t take the eyelashes close to heart, on this photo they have just been rooted, I didn’t trim and cut them yet.)

 

Round and oval shapes show areas where hair is “almost invisible”, which means they are rare (temple) or very short (nasal bone).

   

I usually start drawing eyebrows from painting the most visible hair, above the inside corner of the eye, doing quite long strokes which go along the eyebrow shape.

 

 Those long strokes get together on the eyebrow.

 

Then I continue painting strokes, adding few little ones on top, closer to the temples.

 

 

 After that I use tiny short strokes to draw the part of the eyebrow closest to the nose.

I suggest practicing on paper first, repeating the eyebrow shape over and over. That’s how I used to do anyway. It will give your hand a good idea about the eyebrow shape. I guarantee you good results with your babies’ eyebrows in a while after repeating this drawing exercise ;-)

Hello baby Nicolette

This is Nicolette...

I am endlesly proud of her and love her to bits :-) She is created from Teddy Secrist kit which I adore. About a month ago I put myself togeter and said to my husbant that I don't need anything else for Christmas exept reborn kit... I don't regret it because now, after a month of work  I have a beautiful baby on my hands :-) Reborning world is beautiful! I wish I knew before how easier it is to work with ready-made soft vinyl kits than with dolls!