Greetings. The purpose to this guide is to provide instructions on creating a great acrylic finish on your unpainted ceramic bisque. The first thing you need to be sure of is that you have a well-cleaned piece of ceramic bisque. When you use a reverse antiquing drybrush technique, all uncleaned seams will show. If you find any, they can be sanded down with a fingernail file or a piece of fine sandpaper.

 There are several ways to dry brush depending on personal choice. Reverse antiquing dry brush is our favorite. Both my husband and I use the technique, but our work looks nothing alike. Even after using these instructions, yours will not look like ours. Everyone has their own strokes and depth perception. So I will do my best to instruct you on this sheet.
<P>First your brushes are extremely important. You must have stiff brushes, special brushes just for dry brushing in a few different sizes. You will need a fine liner for eyes or special detail work once the piece is almost finished.
<P>The first step is to basecoat your entire piece. If you are going for dark flesh tones, use black acrylic paint to basecoat. If you are going for lighter flesh, base coat with either brown or a blue-grey. You will find it is easier to get into the cracks if you use a thin wash. * A wash is paint that has been thinned with water. So after you have base coated your piece, use the wash to get into all the cracks and spaces. Let your piece dry.

You will need a piece of newspaper , coffee filter or a piece of denim.

Take one of your dry brushes and put some white paint on just the tips of the brush. Then work your brush back and forth on the paper until it looks like you have wiped all the paint off your brush. (trust me, there is still paint in the brush) Next I want you to use short strokes to go over the black (grey) on everything except the SKIN. Do not put white on the skin. The white will fade in and out on your piece and this is good as it will add contrast to the color when it is applied. Do not go into the cracks with the white. Do this until you have shaded your piece. You will see the depth as you work.

If you look at your hand, fingers close together, you will see that although the fingers are together, the definition is darker between them. This is the effect we are trying to achieve. PLEASE remember…wipe the paint off your brush well so that there will be no globes or brush strokes on your piece

After you have applied what you feel is enough white , chose the colors you want to use for the clothing and anything else that is attached to your piece. Use the same process with the paint, apply just a bit on the tip of the brush, work it good on the paper and then start with your brushing strokes. It is going to go through an UGLY phase when it is going to look terrible…keep going, it gets better, I promise. Keep this process up until you have reached the desire color. It is easier to use darker colors over the black than it is to try to use the lighter colors.

NOTE: Example--If I wanted a light red dress, I would start our with a deep shade of red, dry brush that on, then go to a lighter shade of red, it puts more contrast on the piece, gives more shadows too. Don’t be afraid of the colors, the worse case, you can paint it black again and start over.

Now it's time to work on the flesh. You are going to dry brush the skin just like you did the rest of the piece. Try to stay out of the cracks until you have the skin almost done, then you can gauge just how much color you should put around the eyes, under the nose, around the nose and so on.. Put your piece down, walk away and come back, it will look different once you take a break and return. Work on the color until you achieve the look you want.

If you notice you now have a well defined piece with shadows and no definite lines, everything has been blended and shadowed. All that is left now is to add the eyes, eyelashes and decorations.

NOTES: I sometimes will wet my brush and dry it out really good just because I find it easier to dry brush for me. I like long bristles, my husband likes short ones. You will find out what is comfortable for you the longer you work with this technique. Be patient, you are a developing artist.

I did my best to explain this technique, but, if you have questions, please…don’t be afraid to contact me. I will be more than happy to try to help you. Also, don’t be afraid to experiment, that is how techniques are developed.

Happy Painting