Ok ... here are my settings:

 

Lip setting for the Lavender lips

Sky setting using RDNA's skydome. (It's simpler than the envirosphere for scenes like this)

My Render settings are: 

Now I do have another light in the scene, an infinate light, but it's diffuse and specular are turned to black so that it is used to light the preview window only. Now does it matter than in preview mode the lips show up as black? like the inverted mask? 

I think that is all the settings. 

I did notice on some of the renders by ghostship2 that the lips are extra bright, saturated ... while mine have more contrast.  Could the contrast be the cause of the shadows around the lips?

Look forward to more responses.

Boni

P.S., gholstship2, please feel free to PM me with information you feel sensitive for any reason. :)

Boni

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"Be Hero to Yourself" -- Peter Tork