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Crayon portraiture

INSTRUCTIONS FOR USING LIQUID WATER COLORS.

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Fill the two tumblers with water, and have all the other materials ready and convenient to work with. If you have selected a burnished and mounted photograph wet its surface with saliva; unburnished photographs, photogravures and engravings do not require this treatment, but in coloring them it will be necessary to mix a weak solution of gum arabic with the colors to prevent their penetrating the paper. If printed on too thin a paper the photogravure or engraving should be mounted. If it is found that the colors "crawl" or spread on the photograph, mix a little acetic acid with the colors you are using, and should this fail to remove the difficulty, rub a pinch of pumice stone over the photograph with the fingers.

If the photograph is a portrait commence with the background, washing it all over with a brushful of diluted color, being careful not to get any on the face. If the background is light, use a weak solution of blue, if dark, a brown solution. The majority of backgrounds only need a very little tinting—just sufficient to change the color. For the face use flesh color, diluting it to the proper shade, washing it entirely over the face, and with a stronger solution of the same color tint the cheeks and lips, giving them a little brighter effect than the flesh color. Touch up the shadows in the face with the brown, and if there are any reflected lights use a very weak solution of the yellow color for them; then with some very weak black make the shadows around the mouth a little darker; next with a solution of blue, also very weak, strengthen the shadows in the forehead and around the temples; then color the eyes, using a small brush. If they are blue, use a weak solution of blue, if gray, use a little black, and if brown, then that color. Next color the hair; if brown, use brown mixed with a little black to take away the reddish color; if auburn, use brown and yellow, with a little gray between the lights and shadows. In working on the hair, move your brush in the direction of the lines of the hair; if wavy, then cause your brush to follow its lines. After you have thus gone over it, darken the shadows with a stronger solution of the same color. After the hair, paint the eyebrows and beard, if there is any, with the same color.

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