Thread: Painting a latex Puppet head

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Hopefully someone can help me out. This is my first post at this forum.

I've built the puppet head from foam and filled it with great stuff for rigidity. I've put on two coats of mask latex so it's ready for paint but I don't know how to do that! I've looked online for tutorials on youtube or webpages that talk about painting a good looking realistic flesh look for a mask but can't find any that aren't just talking about making morbid decaying masks. How do you paint a latex prop to have the appearance of real skin?

I was thinking of using White Latex Exterior House paint and then mixing in acrylic paint as tint. Will that work for mask latex?

anyways...here's my head. I want him to appear older and I'm gonna add some tufts of hair on top of his head and give him some eyebrows too. Any help would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!









That's a roll of masking tape in his mouth I'm using to hold it open.

Welcome to the family !! Latex house paints really not work without peeling like skin if you re using it as a puppet.House paint just wasn't meant for that kind of flex mask wise.
Acrylic artist paints are best in thin layers. Skin colors have yellow & green hues in them. How morbid color wise are you looking to go.
A thin primer is best so paints will stick to it. A few masks I've used rubber cement thinned down & added colorant for a flexible paint that sticks.
Are you planning to paint with a brush or airbrush ?

yea i would go with acrylics too. maybe use some latex on something small and try i befor eyou hitup that awesome head

I've also read about adding your color to the latex & painting on another coat of latex.

I've not tried this myself, it was just a tip I read somewhere else.

wow! Thank you guys so much for all the good advice! I'm gonna use acrylic I think and I'm gonna mix it with this Pros-Aide Adhesive I just bought from Monster Makers. So sort of the rubber cement route. I'm thinking I still need to do the thin layer at a time approach. Maybe put it on with a sponge for more even application? I really didn't mean for the skin to be so dark. I really wanted an older person type skin on it...with some thin veins and age spots. Sort of like what this guy looks like: