Oil tinting techniques to enhance and build back detail....skin tones washed out from flash, sunlight, over exposure,or fading,, a wash of transparent oil paint and techniques that I learned from my mother,Dixie Laval..... This round blob of color turned to a face is a lesson I watched Dixie teach many, many students over the years. She asked them to make a round area of paint on the back of a print, then with cotton and a stick, make "swabs" to rub out detail,, leaving it darker in the shadows, and bright highlights softnening the edges, creating shapes. Like looking at a pool table ball, it has a bright highlight that softens out as the light rolls around the ball ...

 

Start with a transparent oil glaze,,

then rub smooth with soft dacron or cotton....



with a cotton swab,, begin rubbing off the paint in the highlights,, in this exercise, making them up as you go,, on a print,, using the detail there, to enhance.



start with the brightest highlight

softening the edges...

Detail is just paint rubbed off, and left on...

This example is a faded print.. copied to be restored.. the large poster was used for a guide on detail..