Date: Wed, 16 Oct 2002 03:18:12 -0700
From: "Judith Northwood"
Subject: RE: Painting dem bones?

Well, first you have to decide the age and appearance of the bones.

Fresh bones will be very slightly peachy white and will have small
amounts of very white tendon attached and likely red (truly fresh) or
grey-greenish (drained and rotting) muscle bits at the ends of the
tendons. If exsanguinated and still fresh, the muscle will be a sort of
purplish-grey-white.

Bones generally yellow with time, so the longer they've been "dead", the
darker the yellow will be. Peat bogs (ponds that fill in with peat)
will turn bone (and all flesh for that matter) dark brown (warm brown,
something of a orange hue). If bones have been buried in primitive
conditions, they will also have dirt/rock clinging to them. The
yellowing is (to simplify the process) a matter of calcium loss. When
bones are buried, the calcium is typically replaced by other minerals
(thus fossilization - we do it deliberately with teeth when we give
fluoride treatments) and so the color change will vary somewhat
depending on what mineral does the replacement, but it will always be an
"earth" color, so a very muted yellow to orange. It's a safe bet to go
with earthy, not bright, yellow, shifting to yellow-brown with age, and,
eventually, if you want the appearance of extreme age, a deep brown,
like what you see of dinosaur skeletons in museums.

When bones aren't buried in the earth, they yellow some, but not as
much, and they will generally have more grey to their color than bones
that have been buried. The process of decay will still cause some
discoloration and the decalcification still happens, thus the loss of
white pigment (calcium is still used as a white pigment in artist
paints). Only boiling and bleaching will create a bright white, and
even that fades, just more slowly. Even boiling alone without the use
of bleaching will give the same results as air exposure of the corpse,
though the loss of soft tissue will be significantly faster. Over time,
bones that haven't been buried with acquire an almost greenish cast
(yellow mixed with grey or black yields a greenish color). A desert
sun, though, will lighten bones quite a bit, especially over time - I
guess you could call that sun-bleached - there's an interesting idea for
a Bedouin-type undead warrior, there.

As for specific paint names, I tend to play a lot and blend a great
deal, and there have been quite a few good suggestions made already, so
I stuck with the theoretical. OK, fine, that's what I usually do,
anyway.

Hope it gives some creative thoughts!

:^)

Judith