Leather

Rancid

New member
Hi,
just a quick question: Which colors do you use for Leather? I start with scorched brown, highlightet with bestial brown and Snakebite Leather. Do you agree or do you mix the browns for example with a grey tone etc? I ask, because I'm not really satisfied with the result...
 

Wyrmypops

New member
They're the colours I instantly gravitate to for brown leather. For extreme highlights in introduce Bubonic Brown and/or White to the Snakebite.
Could try adding a bit of dark brown ink back into the recesses if that's the end of the scale that you ain't satisfied with.

I tend to reserve greyed browns for aged items. I'm more inclined to add to add a brown to dirty up other colours.

Greying up brown, can be easy cos brown being a mix of opposite colours it occupies a place that reacts well with black or white. A dark paint like that Scorched Brown or a brown ink, with white added moves into a yummy range of grey/browns.
 

Einion

New member
Rancid said:
I ask, because I'm not really satisfied with the result...
Experiment then, try and few things and see what you think yourself.

Most people develop certain go-to colours or methods of painting things like leather and if they're used all the time things can get stale. Just a little bit of red, orange or yellow, or a flesh colour mixed into a basecoat can make all the difference between the normal way of doing something and something a little boring.

I don't know if you go for any kind of wear or weathering effects on your paintjobs but just those can go a long way to enlivening even the same old colours you always use - orangey worn edges at areas of high wear; a dark, grungy colour applied in areas that get handled at lot or are near a source of grease or moisture. This sort of thing is well worth trying.

Einion
 

Einion

New member
P.S. Leather can also be grey, black, colours and even white or ivory/beige; no reason it has to be brown all the time. But even just sticking to brown there's tan, medium brown, the colour of milk chocolate, dark chocolate, burnt sienna etc. etc.

Einion
 

airhead

Coffin Dodger / Keymaster
Leather has been dyed for ages.

Raw leathers slowly change colors as they are used.

Right now, my shoes have some white leather on them, belt is black leather, watchband is a cordovan (red brown), holster is a mahogany brown. The backside of the holster and the belt are both a tan color, but the back side of the holster has some nice darker browns where it sets against my body.

In my wife's closet, you can find leather shoes in white, red, blue, navy, black, green, etc.

**
My point is that leathers can come in almost any color under the rainbow.
 

PegaZus

Stealth Freak
Leather has been dyed for ages.
My point is that leathers can come in almost any color under the rainbow.
I suppose the trick then is to make it looked like dyed leather. Just highlight the edges in tan? Or is there some better way?
 

Rancid

New member
Thx so far. I' aware that there is leather in almost every color, but I didn't get it look like leather... I guess I have to try some color schemes.
 

Einion

New member
Well honestly if a belt is not brown it doesn't really tend to look like leather - I mean you don't automatically see it and think, "Ah, leather."

Compare this_____________________________to this

s1722.jpg
old+cowboy+boots.jpg


Do those red boots really look like leather? I don't think so; belts, boots and a few other things will automatically be taken to be leather when we look at them but especially in miniature they don't look like that material for sure.

The only way to sell a coloured item as leather would be to show some wear, where the wear reveals a natural leather colour here and there, but this is harder to do in a very small scale and it's requires a certain style of paintjob too which might not be what you want.

So if you like a clean, even bright and cartoony, paintjob just paint things as you like and don't worry about the materials they're made from so much. Only with a highly-realistic style do we need to concentrate on this.

Einion
 
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