My WIP - got any advice? (it's more about an idea than a WIP really...)

[CapnBloodbeard]

Hi all,

decided to post my WIPs and ask for advice.

For my outcasts I've decided to go for a white/blue colour scheme with red trim.  Chose that because it's a fairly uncommon scheme for this faction, and I thought the 'clean' look for this could work out well.  Well, except for Hannah because I chose purple for her first.  Anyhoo.  

 

My problem with painting is that 1) I'm terrible at it and 2) I don't enjoy it.  And these compound.  Invariably I've spent a few hours on a model and hate my WIP so I never finish anything.  It's frustrating because my brush control isn't great so I feel like I'm spending way too much time just fixing my mistakes.  

And as a result I've tried to paint fast before painting 'good' .  I probably should have gone the other way.  I never figured out how to 'thin' paints (the watered paints never seemed to stay where I want them to) - I only read last night that if you're using this technique then you need to wipe your brush on paper towel to draw off the water from the brush.  

Anyway, looking at these models I think the white bits I should have base coated with my shadow colour first (thinking of blue actually), so may have to go over the white with that.  

Lazarus, can't think of really anything else to do with him.  I think it works, it's just 'meh'.

As can be seen I haven't started on any shading or highlighting.  Any thoughts?  Am I potentially on the right track?

[H4ml3t]

Long post incoming...

[H4ml3t]

I've been where you're now at and I may be able to help. We'll start with your current models and then I'll talk about a technique  I use that may help you moving forward.

On all non-white areas do a drybrush of a lighter color then go back with a dark grey or black wash. If you need help with drybrushing hit youtube. For the wash you can either buy a wash or mix your dark colored paint with a 50/50 mix of water and Pledge Acrylic Floor Shine. You want the wash to be thin--paint it over a newspaper and you should be able to easily read the paper through the wash. 

On the white/silver areas, skip the dry brush but do an even thinner dark wash over it.

The idea with the drybrush is that the paint only goes on to the raised area of the mini that would catch the light and appear brighter. The dark wash will then take away the "chalky" effect that the dry brush leaves behind and shades the low areas on the mini that would be darker due to shadow. This leaves your original color as the mid-tone, the drybrushing is your highlight and the wash is your low-tone. Having 3 layers of color will give your mini much more depth and make it look way better. 

Then if you feel like it, you can go back and pick out details with a small brush with very little paint on it. Again, this step is up to you.

Basing also goes a long way and can be as simple as putting thinned white school glue on the base and dropping grass effect over it.

I'll have more to say later but this should help for now. Remember that any painted/based model looks phenomenally better than grey plastic and at Tabletop distance no one will see your mistakes or imperfections.

[CapnBloodbeard]

Thanks for those.  I will do proper basing on those.  

Reckon the colour scheme is okay or needs a reboot?  I always start painting then hating the colours I've chosen   

A more dulled blue may have been a little better.

[H4ml3t]

I think your color scheme is fine and the dark wash over the blue will dull it down. I've got tips for future minis that I'll try to post tomorrow. Feel free to reply or message me if you've got questions in the meantime.

[Treehouse]

@CapnBloodbeard:

If your aim is mostly to paint fast and in tabletop quality (since you don't enjoy painting), you might want to consider pre-shading and washing your miniatures.

 

 

 

Spray-prime them black from below. Then spray-prime them grey from the side (this will cover up most of the black, which is fine). Then give it a spray coat of white from the top (and slightly at an angle). Adjust so that you hit all surfaces at least slightly with white. But only the parts standing out the most - or that the sun would light.

 

 

Then you dilute your colour with a lot of water. You have to try out how much. Load your brush with the paint-water mix. (You can add some matte-varnish too). Tip the thick part of your brush against a paper towel to unload most of the water (you don't want it to float everywhere). Then brush it over your miniature.

 

Not all colours work with this method, some don't cover the black (yellow for example) and look a bit weired and the miniature is not so vivid in colour. But it's really, really fast and gives decent results, even when looked at from afar. With training on your brush control and planning which colours to use on each model beforehand, you could paint a crew (at least without tiny details) in an evening. The stage in the picture above took ybout 10 minutes.

 

[Scatterbrain]

10 hours ago, CapnBloodbeard said:

Reckon the colour scheme is okay or needs a reboot?  I always start painting then hating the colours I've chosen   

A more dulled blue may have been a little better.

I reckon just keep ploughing on rather than painting over what basecoats you've got. If you're too critical and keep going back over what you've already done, you may never actually finish!

Instead of painting over the blue with a different basecoat, you could try augmenting what's already there? For example, a diluted wash (1 paint:3 water) with something like Citadel's Drakenhof Nightshade, to run into the cracks and add depth. Then Citadel's Gulliman Blue Glaze to visually sit overtop. Lastly, a highlight of the same blue you used for the basecoat with a little white mixed in, just over the creases sculpted into the material, will help make the fabric look like it's swirling and dynamic.

[H4ml3t]

3 hours ago, Treehouse said:

@CapnBloodbeard:

If your aim is mostly to paint fast and in tabletop quality (since you don't enjoy painting), you might want to consider pre-shading and washing your miniatures.

 

 

 

Spray-prime them black from below. Then spray-prime them grey from the side (this will cover up most of the black, which is fine). Then give it a spray coat of white from the top (and slightly at an angle). Adjust so that you hit all surfaces at least slightly with white. But only the parts standing out the most - or that the sun would light.

 

 

Then you dilute your colour with a lot of water. You have to try out how much. Load your brush with the paint-water mix. (You can add some matte-varnish too). Tip the thick part of your brush against a paper towel to unload most of the water (you don't want it to float everywhere). Then brush it over your miniature.

 

Not all colours work with this method, some don't cover the black (yellow for example) and look a bit weired and the miniature is not so vivid in colour. But it's really, really fast and gives decent results, even when looked at from afar. With training on your brush control and planning which colours to use on each model beforehand, you could paint a crew (at least without tiny details) in an evening. The stage in the picture above took ybout 10 minutes.

 

This was going to be my next suggestion. I prime all black and then drybrush white but the end result is basically the same. I also mix my paint with 50/50 water and Pledge Acrylic Floor Shine. Whatever mix you use try it  on newspaper--a good starting point is when the color is pretty solid on the paper but you can still read the print through it. The idea is that the paint is thin enough for the preshading you've done in the priming process to show through a bit.

The nice thing about this method is that you get good results pretty quickly. That makes painting fun so you do it more and your brush control improves and you get better and better at the techniques your using. Then if you feel like it you can start adding in new techniques and effects and all of the sudden your giving advice to others on how to get better results. At least that's how it worked for me and I hope it will serve you well too.

[misterfinn]

@CapnBloodbeard long post ahoy...tl;dr I think mini-painting is unlikely to become fast or enjoyable for you unless you grit your teeth and grind through the fundamentals first.

In my experience, much of the effort for a new hobbyist is front loaded. Everything sucks until you’re comfortable with the tools - in this case, your brush and your paint. When I first started taking architecture classes in college (pre-CAD), the curriculum didn’t use t-squares or templates or any of that stuff. I drew circles and long straight lines, freehand, over and over and over and over. I drew dark-to-light shading boxes with pencil and with charcoal, over and over and over and over. I hated it. Once I’d had the practice, though, I could draw just about anything quickly and accurately because the techniques had become second nature. Similar experience playing guitar - practicing scales is almost as fun for me as eating glass but I can’t think about the music if I’m concentrating on where to put my fingers. 

All of which is a long winded way of saying: there are plenty of shading and highlighting techniques and materials out there, but I don’t think you’ll be satisfied with any of the results until you learn good brush control. Drybrushing often causes rough texture and uneven coverage. Washing often causes splotches and streaks. The end result looks messy, which is frustrating. These techniques are much easier to learn if you’re already comfortable with your tools and you can paint flat color neatly. Part of the reason that Treehouse’s pre-shaded model looks so awesome is that the colors are applied smoothly, with clean edges and uniform opacity.

You can mitigate the pain of practicing something you don’t like by starting with good tools. I’m mostly thinking of brushes here. A high quality sable brush that holds a sharp point is essential. I use a Winsor & Newton size 1 kolinsky sable round brush for everything from cloaks to eyeballs, but there are a few other brands out there of similar quality. Consider using a wet palette as well. Wet palettes (which are simple to make with paper towels and baking parchment if you don’t want to buy one) help to maintain your paint consistency over a long period of time. Concentrating on your brush control is much easier if you don’t have to fiddle with your paint every 20 minutes.

As far as your current models go, I think your blue and brown are just fine. White is a notoriously difficult color to paint well, though, so you might consider a different choice there. Slate grey or grey-green maybe. Pure greens (like kelly green), yellows, and reds tend to require several coats to get a smooth color so I’d stay away from those.

My 2 scrip and YMMV. 

Edited January 29, 2018 by misterfinn
Slight edit for clarity

[H4ml3t]

Any Updates or WIP @CapnBloodbeard? I hope it's going well for you.

 

[CapnBloodbeard]

I've done some very basic tabletop standard painting for a tournament that's in..... hours, goddammit, time for bed!  basic block paintin + wash, I haven't even highlighted, except drybrush on some.  But I can touch them up later.  

I want to work on some of the techniques here but haven't had the chance to get into more yet.  

Made a few mistakes, but to make mistakes on these rush jobs when if I green stuff it later, I don't feel like I've wasted my own effort.  

 

 

[H4ml3t]

Good luck at the tournament!

[lusciousmccabe]

I wouldn't worry too much about your brush control. It's normal to go back over various areas to cover up your mistakes. Particularly when two different areas of the model adjoin directly it can be impossible to paint up to the edge of one without getting some paint on the other. 

When your paint is thinned down it can be easy to remove any overspill with a damp brush (i.e. one you've wet and wiped the excess off). If the paint sets you can also cover over it more easily when it's thinned down. 

I think your concept for the models is perfectly solid. The colours look good and are cleanly applied. I'd recommend basing the crew and finishing all the base colours before moving on to highlighting. That way you've got a better sense of progress and models you can happily put on the table. 

As for improving your painting skill, I'm finding more and more that there aren't any shortcuts really. When you see a nice looking model chances are someone put in a lot of hours painting it, and a whole lot practicing on other models before it. 

The main thing is not to get dissatisfied with your results. Every model you paint is going to improve your skills. Don't be afraid to 'ruin' a model. A sketch artist never worried about ruining a sheet of paper. If you find in a year's time your skills have drastically improved you can always come back and re-do your initial models to bring them up to scratch, or keep them as a reminder of how far you've come. 

There are certain ways of getting a model finished in short order like what Treehouse suggested (dipping is another one). If you find after a while that you still don't enjoy painting I'd recommend looking into those (in fact, you should try them either way and see how you get on). I've done a few crews like that myself (mostly when I've preferred the rules to the models) and it's pretty satisfying.

The only caveat I'd give is that usually with those methods the order you do things in hugely important. You typically need to get the model to a certain point, apply glazes or washes and then not touch it again. This can give you quite a good looking model (amazing considering the time it takes) but you can't do much  to make it look better after applying the final step.

If you want some useful resources on painting techniques check out Doctor Faust's painting clinic, tutofig and Massive Voodoo. Also just google any term you hear someone use and you can probably find a tutorial on it with a bit of trawling. Reading up on painting techniques and watching other painters is a great way to learn new skills, just remember you're not going to get results like them on your first try.