Damn my eyes!

[wobbly_goggy]

I hate doing eyes on models (I am thinking humans specifically here).

Anyone have any tips/help/advice/useful links they've used?

 

Sidenote - what colour do you paint your gremlins' eyes?

[Caedrus]

@wobbly_goggy: Here's a link!

[wobbly_goggy]

6 minutes ago, Caedrus said:

@wobbly_goggy: Here's a link!

That's great, thank you!

 

[lusciousmccabe]

Just Do It!

Eyes are a pain and will continue to be a pain forever if you don't bite the bullet and turn a few minis cross-eyed. Doesn't take a huge amount of attempts in my experience if you start off simple and are realistic about what you can fit in. 

Following a method is a good idea, there are lots of good ways to do eyes out there so there's no point reinventing the wheel. Here's a video with a lot of fairly detailed eyes. Anything you find works well in your drawings should be applicable to models, as long as you account for scale. 

For smaller scale eyes use your same method but with fewer elements. With human scale Malifaux figures the black dot in the middle is pretty good going (although I have seen some people expanding the eyes with paint so they can get more detail in there). Larger eyes can have a point of reflection and if they're really big a coloured iris and a pupil. Just make sure the iris has a black outline if your doing one as it'll look weird otherwise and don't worry if you can't get things perfectly symmetrical on your first couple of minis. 

[wobbly_goggy]

33 minutes ago, lusciousmccabe said:

Just Do It!

Eyes are a pain and will continue to be a pain forever if you don't bite the bullet and turn a few minis cross-eyed. Doesn't take a huge amount of attempts in my experience if you start off simple and are realistic about what you can fit in. 

Following a method is a good idea, there are lots of good ways to do eyes out there so there's no point reinventing the wheel. Here's a video with a lot of fairly detailed eyes. Anything you find works well in your drawings should be applicable to models, as long as you account for scale. 

For smaller scale eyes use your same method but with fewer elements. With human scale Malifaux figures the black dot in the middle is pretty good going (although I have seen some people expanding the eyes with paint so they can get more detail in there). Larger eyes can have a point of reflection and if they're really big a coloured iris and a pupil. Just make sure the iris has a black outline if your doing one as it'll look weird otherwise and don't worry if you can't get things perfectly symmetrical on your first couple of minis. 

Thanks for the info!

I have been painting minis (including eyes) for 24 years... but practice doesn't always mean perfect and I get tired of wanting to scream at minis after doing the eyes 5 times...

[lusciousmccabe]

What do you find the biggest issue when you're painting eyes?

[wobbly_goggy]

2 hours ago, lusciousmccabe said:

What do you find the biggest issue when you're painting eyes?

A few things.

-How to squeeze them in when the space is very small (currently experiencing this with Johan. I have a Windsor and Newton series something which tends to keep the point very well and I have used citadel fine detail brushes but don't get on with them beyond using layer brushes for basecoats/big areas and old brushes for overbrushing/drybrushing)

-wonky eyes - one bigger, one pupil bigger, one pupil staring off to one side slightly.

-unrealistic starey eyes (the first link provided by Caedrus suggests using off white, which is a great idea... seems so obvious now)

-general eye shape, ie blobby, especially when the mini doesn't have crisp detail. This is one of the reasons prefer painting metal toys by far. The detail and crispness is far better, and I find the texture better for 'grabbing' the paint

(if you're in the monthly painting challenge you may have seen my eyes which tend to vary in quality)

[lusciousmccabe]

I hear you alright. Some of the malifaux plastics aren't sculpted with eyes at all as far as I'm concerned.

I actually use some crap synthetic brush for doing eyes. Either like a quadruple 0 or one that has lost half its bristles. I know people say to use a bigger brush with a fine point but I think doing eyes is the exception. You're basically painting tiny dots so not having much capacity on the brush is good since you can't put down too much paint by accidentally pressing a little too much. Synthetic brushes are also way stiffer so it's more like spotting paint on with a needle that's a bit porous.

You do have to make sure to wipe the brush first as it can collect a blob of paint wider than itself. I usually use paint straight out of the bottle to get the most pigment per bristle and if it dries to the brush over time just toss it.

[Sandmann]

One thing I found to make it easier (this assumes you paint them before the rest of the face) is not to try to get the shape right using the white/off-white but to use black to close in on the right shape from the outside basically, i.e. basecoat the eye-area black (thinned down!), blob white or off white in there and then use black again to define the eyes and then paint the pupils.

[(Keenan)]

For human eyes, try doing the whites like in the link above, but to get the pupil use a micron pen.  Black size 005 available at Michael's for a few bucks.  Way easier to get the same sized pupils in my opinion.

[Butch]

Don't paint them. If you're painting for gaming you don't need to paint them.

 

Or you can do something like a "cross". Horizontal line with ivory vertical line with brown. And then a little dip with Agrax earthsahde or strong tone.

Most times there will be an eye that's easier to paint: paint the other first. And don't expect to do everythong right the first try. Eyes are small and very quick overpainted and started again.

[-Loki-]

I find lining the eyes after painting the white to be counter productive.

My method is to use a black wash (I use army painter dark tone) in the eye socket after laying down the flesh tone. Then paint a white strip horizontally through the middle, and then a short black stripe vertically down the middle of that. Then use your flesh tone to clean up around the eye where the wash was a bit heavy. If your white ends up being too long, then a bit of wash in that area will blend it back in. If your black ends up being a bit long, it gets hidden in the wash anyway. The wash itself gives a softer lined eye effect. I find just using black paint is too harsh.

[prof_bycid]

Maybe someone should take pity on us all and put out a sprue of sun glasses.  😉

[Bar bar bar bar Barbaros]

My technique:

First off, grab yourself a decent brush. Something like a Windsor and Newton Series 7 000 Miniature is ideal and will make a big difference.

Next, thin your paint. I like to use Vallejo Thinner Medium for this, as I find it makes the paint easier to control at the proper consistency.

Now assuming a standard human model, the process I use is this:

Paint the eye socket in an off-black colour (black mixed with some medium brown). Don't be tempted to use pure black - it'll look unnatural. This step is what forms the 'eyeliner'.

Wait for that to dry fully, and then paint an off-white eye within the eyeliner you just painted. For this I use white mixed with a little bone colour (for the reasons outlined above). You may find that using a slightly heavier-duty paint helps for this. I'm currently using Citadel Ceramite White, which is (or at least was) from their 'Base' range. This will give better coverage over dark colours.

Finally, it's time to do the pupil. For this, I tend to use a similar mixture to the eyeliner. For larger eyes (or steadier hands) you may wish to go a bit further with this.

To be honest, I find many of the humanoid Malifaux eyes to be too small to paint at my skill level (I'm used to 40k). My Lilith, for instance, currently just has the eyeliner done in a slightly lighter than usual shade. To be honest, I'm pretty happy with that.

Here's a 40k Dark Angel I painted some years ago using the above technique. One eye is much better than the other:

[Clockwork_Fish]

There’s a shop in Toronto that sells a brush ... can’t recall the brand but that particular size is labelled ‘The Psycho.’  😃

[EnternalVoid]

On 8/30/2018 at 4:42 PM, Clockwork_Fish said:

There’s a shop in Toronto that sells a brush ... can’t recall the brand but that particular size is labelled ‘The Psycho.’  😃

The company is called Army Painter

https://admin.thearmypainter.com/files/products/ProductImages_2015/Brushes/BR7014_ThePsycho_1280x1280_14.png

I personally do the actual black part of the eye with a Pigma Micron 005 art pen currently myself.  Really small tip and I don't have to worry about paint.  It is not perfect but it has worked for me for the moment.