Using Stippling to Prepare a Body for Funeral

Many restorative artists in the Funeral Service industry, to add a more natural look to the restored area, use stippling today. This is done by placing stipple in the waxed over areas with a small brush. This in turn allows the light to diffuse when it hits the surface so that the appearance of normal skin is achieved. To get the desired effect, you will need a stipple brush, a paper towel and a white powder for finishing the area.

To begin, you will want to hold the stippling brush in your forefinger and thumb, and lightly begin to place the ends onto the surface of the restored area. Remember that the pressure you exert will be visible in the marks left behind, so experiment with the pressure you are using to get the correct depth. You do not want to be able to see the individual holes left behind, simply a small indention. This is only used to diffuse the light, not create a point of attention.

Rotate the brush in your fingers while creating stipple across the entire restored area. This helps to recreate the pores in normal human skin. If you are working on the chin or nose, these areas exhibit the largest pores on the face, so remember to make these stipple marks more noticeable. To create the areas of the nose and chin, hold the brush as before between the thumb and forefinger. Now place the end of the bristles onto the ball of the nose and pull straight back at a ninety degree angle, so as not to leave a drag in the makeup. This will recreate those larger pores. When working on the chin area, begin lightly across the sub-mental sulcus to the mental sulcus in a sweeping fashion. This helps to recreate that small triangular area to draw attention to the natural curvature.

When working on the forehead, upper lip or ear, these are the smallest pores visible, and should not be as noticeable as the rest of the face. On these areas, simply use the brush to lightly tap the entire area in a circular fashion to recreate these small pores of little visibility.

When working on lips, no stippling is required, as is the rear of the ear or underside of the eyelids. These areas exhibit no pores visible, and should not be attempted as other areas.

Place your brush into a small amount of powder and gently rub in a circular motion. This dries any remaining makeup that you may have accumulated on the bristles. Now wipe the ends onto the paper towel to remove. DO this as soon as you are finished with your stippling, as the brushes can be expensive to replace if not cleaned properly.

Now you should lightly powder the entire face with your powder brush, and this helps to round out or press away any hard lines that were created when the stippling process was began. Remember that no line or pore on the face has a definite beginning or end, so the natural look of a human face will never be exactly the same from person to person. Relying on the picture and the remaining skin will help you to recreate the look of nature.