Colors

• Mix five colors together to make a basic skin tone in various proportions: cadmium red, Naples yellow, ultramarine blue, titanium white and burnt umber. You could make skin tone with only two or three of these colors; although, you don't want to use only one color, which would be amateurish. Spend time staring at your model's skin before putting any paint to canvas and see how many colors you can really find in any given section. Train your eye to discern between shades of blue, red and gray. As you get more experienced with mixing skin tones, you can try adding complementary colors from the color wheel to add richer depth to your pictures. Mars black and Hooker’s green are two staples that can add some nice effects to flesh-tone painting.
  
  

Underpainting

• Try under-painting for depth. Layer a color underneath, like yellow. Wait for it to dry, then paint as you would normally over it. Little bits of yellow will show through. This under-painting gives the painting depth and texture.
  
  

Light and Shadow

• Authentically painted skin color requires a keen eye for detail. While studying the subject of your portrait, pay close attention to where the light hits the subject, how the shadow affects the colors in the skin and the negative space in the portrait.
  
  

Texturize

• One of the best things about acrylic paint is that it can be thinned with water instead of turpentine. This makes painting and clean up much simpler than with oils. Paint can be added to itself layer upon layer for texture. Impasto can be created with acrylics, much like oil paint, using a special impasto knife and gobs of paint.