washes typically are pretty easy, and they can give beginners a decent finished product.
That being said, there isn't any comparison to a skilled painter with acrylics. If you are new, stick to washes for a main army and practice your acrylics on bits or cheap pieces.

You know what i hate about painting tutorials. Really hate?

None of them go into any detail about the importance of the brush. How much paint goes on the brush, how diluted paint gets when mixed with the brush water.

Then again, none of them go into detail that you can also paint by keeping the brush totally dry and just use the fluidity of the water in the paint.

Also none of them go into depth on to how much paint is too much or too little when covering or when detailing.

So yes, i read all the books and the forums and i know how to 'paint', but how do i FUCKING PAINT?

Yes, i know i have to fucking basecoat/drybru

Fuck this browser.

>>17346948
As you point out, when you clean the brush in water, there will be lots of water in it and it will dilute your next bit of paint that you put on it. This is actually a good thing, because it naturally thins your paints. The key is getting some experience and knowing how much water to leave in it.

Personally, I always make sure to wipe the brush twice on a paper towel to get most of the water out so that it doesn't become too runny before I put more paint on it. Also, I don't put too much paint on the brush either, and I wipe the excess off of both sides of the brush by "brushing" it against the inside lip of the paint can. Basically, the paint on your brush shouldn't be so thick that it swells out, like a water drop.

I'm having trouble explaining these things with typing. You can believe me that I feel your pain - my army is Imperial Fists, and the yellow can be a nightmare if you don't know how much to thin, or how. After some experimenting I've arrived at what I think works for me, but that didn't remove any of the uncertainty at first. That was part of the fun for me, but I'm weird, so take that with a grain of salt.

These are my Fists. I just started the army, so these five are the only ones I have finished. Well, I actually just finished a Chaplain too, but don't have a picture. If you want I can try to answer any questions you have in your post and maybe we can figure it out together.

Cont...

Ok, so part by part:

>None of them go into any detail about the importance of the brush. How much paint goes on the brush, how diluted paint gets when mixed with the brush water.

The brush is actually important. I'm going to assume you have a few different brushes of different sizes (like a big one for base coating and vehicles, and a medium one for smaller areas like shoulder trim and chest eagles, and a smallish one for highlighting and details, and maybe even a smaller one for tiny details) and that you know which ones to use. So, how much paint goes on to the brush?

I never paint with a totally dry brush unless I am drybrushing. For everything else, I always start by dipping the brush into a plastic cup of water I have. Then I use a paper towel to make sure that the whole handle is dry (water that gets on the handle can run down into the brush when you are painting and will suddenly dilute it). Then I wipe the brush on the paper towel twice, once for each side of the brush. That gets most of the water out. You can of course wipe it more or less depending on what works for you. Also, some paint types might require more thinning to coat well (Foundation Paints come to mind since they are much thicker and designed to be thinned) so you might keep a little more water on the brush for them.

So now I dip the tip of the brush into the paint (never the whole brush, just maybe the front third or half or sometimes just the tip if I only want to do a little bit). Then I wipe it against the inside lip of the paint jar twice, both sides, to get most of the excess paint off. If I look at it and there is still too much I wipe on on the paper towel a bit. Then I can paint.

Cont...

>Then again, none of them go into detail that you can also paint by keeping the brush totally dry and just use the fluidity of the water in the paint.

Personally I never do this unless I am drybrushing. First, I like to clean the brushes in the water before dipping in for more paint because I don't want any of the paint to start drying on the brush - that leads to dry clumping which is a death sentence on a yellow mini. Second, I prefer the coats to be a little thinned. My philosophy is that multiple thin coats are always better than a single thick coat. This is especially true with yellow. Even with a dark color like black (I painted up a few Templars for a friend) I used some slightly water thinned black to do the first coat over the black spray primer. Thick coats will begin to cover detail, but thin coats will serve you better. It just takes a little longer.

Back in 3rd edition when I was painting my last army (I haven't played a game since 2005 because of college) I didn't try to thin any of the paints and used a completely dry brush. My army was the Ultramarines (yeah I know I know, but they were still sorta cool back then) and the blue covered ok. I didn't wash the minis or use any highlights back then though. If I were to paint them today, I'd definitely thin them and do multiple coats instead of one.

>Also none of them go into depth on to how much paint is too much or too little when covering or when detailing.

Yeah, this is actually very important and goes back to what I was talking about with "multiple thin coats is always better than one thick coat." It is always better to err on the side of to little paint and have to dip more frequently than to put on a thick layer with a lot of paint. With the color yellow this is probably the most important concept. The yellow colors, particularly the Golden Yellow color that I use for Fists doesn't cover very well at all. It is very important to resist the tempation to compensate for the yellow's poor coverage by using a lot of paint. When I paint yellow I start with a darker Iyanden Darksun foundation, and gradually build up the yellow color over multiple thin coats so that the shade very gradually brightens to where I want it.

The key is that you want it to be thinned, but you don't want it to pool up in one area, which is usually a symptom of too much paint, or too much water. You also want to clean the brush in the water between each dip in the paint, and repeat the process above, because you don't want the yellow to dry on the paintbrush, which leads to clumping on the mini - which looks bad with yellow.

When it comes to detailing, I still water down the paint some. When I paint details like script using Chaos Black I find that if you use a completely dry brush, the paint won't cover well unless you thin it a bit like you did with the other parts of the mini. Once again, you don't want it to be so watery that it runs. You want it to go on smooth with some wiggles of your detail brush. The only other way to get it to cover is to use a lot of paint, and that ruins detail like that.

Cont...

I guess that what I'm saying is that if you clean your brush in between applications, and wipe it on a paper towel to dry it, it'll leave enough water in to thin it a bit, but not so much that it runs like water (I suppose you want it to look more like milk). If you notice that it is too much or too little, just stop and repeat. If it got a lot of pooled up thinned watery paint on your mini, you can quickly fix it by washing off the paint on your brush, and then quickly drying it off with the paper towel. Then, without putting any more paint on it, use the dryer brush to absorb some of the watery paint, and essentially wipe it off while spreading it out. It's hard to describe. It'd be much easier to show you these things in a video or in person than to type them, but I tried ;_;

I hope this helped some. Not sure if I answered your questions exactly, but painting can sometimes be frustrating. Since I had those same questions in the past, I sympathize.

Also, this is just how I do it, other painters probably use different methods. I know some use palettes to mix and thin the paints, some use paint thinner, and I've even heard of some people using a drop of soap. But I'm not bold enough to try those kinds of things.

Wow.

I really didn't think it'd get a serious answer. Thank you for your time. I guess /tg/ really is one of the better parts of 4chan.

Now, for a proper reply.

I have painted quite a bit until now, and have spent literally over a dozen hours on a mini that came out what other people barely call table-top-worthy (pic sort of related). I have learned little by little what you've said and i do know what it's like to read 'just apply a wash' and schitzo over 'what do you mean you just splosh it on'.

My method is similar to yours but i think more OCD. Starting with a dirty brush, I wash the brush in a general container, then fully dry it with a paper towel and then wash it in a 'clean' container. Then i proceed to gently tap the brush on the paper towel until i get the exact 'fluidity' of the brush i want. Then i just dip the tip in the little cup that the Citadel paints have.

I brush maybe 4-5 times and then i tip it in again. This repeats about 2-3 times and then i have to get the brush wet again. If at any time i get a bit too much paint, i paper towel, then dip the tip in water to re-wet the brush and gently tap the paper towel again to get it in the right 'fluidity', while still keeping the paint in the brush.

For detail work (i need a clear point/line) i keep the brush on the dry side and then more like point-point-point my way rather than 'paint'.

My friend is totally reverse with this. He keeps the brush brutally dry, though i think he thinned the paints. He allows the consistency of the paint to dictate the right consistency on the brush as far as i got. He does great work, a lot better than mine, though he does wear out brushes incredibly fast because of the brutal brush-drying.

You were expecting a "thin your paints" with a picture of herp, derp, slurp, and burp?

>>17347488
Oh cool. My first miniatures were Battletech minis way back in the 90s. Kudos.

I suppose if he thins the paint in the pot, then you could paint with a dry brush but... As you say it brutally shortens the life of the brush. Like I was talking about, it worked for me way back in the day when I was painting my Ultramarine army and I just used one thick layer of paint. The army still looked nice because I was a very "neat" painter since I had a decade of experience painting Battletech minis. So even though it could have looked much better, everything was neat and clean looking and I eventually started experimenting with details like script on the armor and purity seals. I had some freehand experience from my B-tech minis as well.

But if you don't thin your paints outside then I think it is very important to paint with a slightly damp, clean brush. What he does is probably either thin them in the pot, or more likely, he uses a palette and thins them there. Or maybe he doesn't. I never thinned my paints back in the day when I did my Ultramarines either. You can get away with it with certain colors. But I guarantee you that he won't be able to paint yellow Imperial Fists without thinning the paints and using multiple coats. It's just not possible. Personally, I don't thin the paints off the brush, and rely on the water in the brush to achieve my desired results. Call it lazyness or maybe I'm just too cheap to buy a palette, but it works for me and my Fists, so I'm sure that you can improve too.

Really it comes down to experience. The more models you paint, the better you'll get. The change will be gradual, but you'll notice it when you go back and look across your collection. You may even see the improvements as you go from squad to squad in 40k, or from each Lance and Star in B-tech.

Cont...

As for painting time, I admit that I paint like a snail myself. It takes me forever to paint one mini. I think that if I organized it into a sort of assembly line style for each squad I could get them finished much quicker than painting each mini individually.

I see on your mini that you are drybrushing highlights onto the main part of the mini and highlighting other parts. My suggestion for drybrushing as opposed to highlighting, would be to do local drybrushing. What I mean is that you pick the area that you want to have the silver highlight (or in this case battleworn parts where the paint is worn off, like on the edges) and only drybrush there. It's harder to do than simply drybrushing the whole mini, but you might find that it gives slightly better finish. For example, lick an edge that you want to wear down or highlight, and drybrush it lightly across the edge until you have what you want. You shouldn't drybrush across a flat surface unless you are doing something special, like a very dark green color. I've seen some drybrushed Dark Angels that looked really good. They started with the darkest of dark greens, and drybrushed the lighter shades of green onto it to catch edges and lighten the color. Then they did the lightest highlight color drybrush only over the specific details and raised parts that they wanted to bring out the most.

Cont...

This idea can apply to washes as well. If you look at my Fists, I used a Gryphonne Sepia wash to create the shadows. But I didn't just wash the whole mini, or that would have ruined the shade of yellow that I had created. So I took a detail brush and carefully "painted" in the wash only into the cracks and shaded areas that I wanted. So washes don't only have to be used across huge areas, and neither does drybrushing.

Just some ideas for you to experiment with. I like it, it looks a lot better than my first Btech minis. Another thing that will make them look more impressive is trying out some textured bases or using static grass.

>>17347758
My god,

>lick an edge that you want to wear down and highlight

I clearly meant PICK an edge. Whoops, lol.

Archiving thread 17346808
Thread found.

>>17347843
but why?

What is dry brushing and how do i thin my paints?

Great tips all around.

I'm not any of the posters before but i would like to contribute my share of learning experiance while painting.

One of the things i constantly screwed up while painting, leaving aside the issues you guys already brought into play, was the general overall theme consistency in the models.

When i started, i had a problem with visualizing the models bigger than they actually were, and thus i permitted to do some patterns and color swatches that when you put the mini down on the table, looked almost 'carnivale'-like. Even after i came to knowing i'm doing it, i still did it.

So i started doing something else. Even if i knew how i wanted a mini to come out, i took a picture of the mini off camo-specs or something, modified as necessary with crude Photoshop to fit what i had in mind and then printed the image.

I found it a lot easier to not get into 'micro-painting' evreything when i had a template right in front of me of how it 'should' look. My ratio of carnivale-minis went down considerably.

What i'm trying to say here is "think simple". You can fill a mini with detail but don't 'overpopulate' it. Think of, for example, a Battlestar Galactica Viper with a gray finish and a simple red, white and black 'mustang' line drawn from nose to engine. It has a huge effect with relatively 'little' patterning and excessive design.

Same goes for camouflage, don't micro it. Four large swaths of black on green do a lot more for the mini then a supercomplex patterns.

One thing I've often wondered is how far along in construction do people do their painting. I've seen some guys who won't paint until everything is fully built, but to me that seems to make it harder than it needs to be. Using marines as an example, it's perfectly possible to assemble, clean and (mostly) paint the torso, arms and legs before final assembly without compromising the final result.

>>17347955

If no-body else will get this..

Paints in the base form are literally the acrylic compound. What you see being sold as 'foundation' or basecoat paint, washes or 'inks' are literally different concentrations of 'water' to paint.

Paints with higher paint-to-water ratios cover better, as in, puts more paint on the miniature, but may obstruct details because it's, if you would call it so, 'more dense'. Thinner paint, like normal paints or washes, are designed to cover an area, but still be liquid enough to spread and get into recesses. Washes and inks are specially designed to 'flow' and not to 'cling' on to the mini. These are lower in paint concentration to water.

Painting with thick paints will be like putting goo/globbing on the mini, and less about 'contouring' the paint to the miniature design. Globbed minis look undetailed, one-colored and like they're 'melting'.

To thin your paints, you either use one of the brush-thinning methods said in this thread, or simply use paint thinner or the soapy water method. What quantities is needed? Usually 1/4 or 2/3, depending on what paints you're using. You can theoretically thin a foundation paint to a wash, but you'd need a lot of thinner and water.

>>17347955
Drybrushing:
>Put brush in paint
>Take out of paint
>Wipe on napkin until almost ALL paint is off
>I mean barely any
>brush back and forth across model

Thinning:
>Take some paint
>Add water/thinner/cum
>take toothpick to gauge the thickness of it

Most people are going to say you want to have the paint at the consistency of milk, but the most important thing about drybrushing and thinning is that you're going to have to experiment with it until you have it to the point you want it.

>>17348046

Some pieces are hard to paint while mounted. Think underside of arms, or big parts that will be too hard to just pretend they're shadowed to wash them black. In those cases, yes, you should paint them separately.

In most cases, i personally paint the mini as a whole. Imagine the 'real' model, in small recesses they will probably be shadowed or outright darkened. You would not paint the underside of a dress or a robe for example? Same goes for armpits or other ligaments.

A good wash will hide all those places, offering contrast and bringing out the rest of the mini .

>>17347955
Drybrushing is used as a quick and easy way to bring some depth to the mini by catching the edges. It's great for use on textured bases. What you do is take a completely dry big brush. Dip the tip into the paint color that you are using for it. Now wipe it back and forth on a paper towel until there is barely any paint left on it, and it is leaving only a light shade of the color. Now, go to the mini and start brushing it lightly back and forth. Keep doing it until it starts to build up some of the color. The goal is for it to build up heavier on the raised edges, giving a sort of highlight to it without you having to actually go in and paint the highlights like I did on the rest of those Fists.

Thinning your paints - When you paint you may notice that the paints are often very thick. You'll find that they cover better, and look nicer if you "thin" them down some. The easiest and cheapest way to do it is with a little bit of water mixed in with your acrylic paint. I've been talking about how to do it by making your brush a little damp so that it naturally thins the paint that you put on it. I'm scared to actually put water or thinner into the paint pot, lest it mess up the color. Other ways you can do it is to use actual paint thinner or some other product similar to it, though i don't recommend this, since water is the best thinner for acrylic paints. Enamel paints require specialized paint thinner. You can use a palette to mix in the water or thinner. I tried it a few times using a plastic plate as the palette. Basically you can put the paint on this, and then mix it with other colors to lighten or darken it, or add some water to thin it some. You can play around with the paint until it is the right consistency that you want on the palette before taking it on your brush and painting it onto the mini.

Great thread guys. If anyone got anything good out of this, please vote here: http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive.html

>>17348046
For my Fists, for a standard Tac Marine with a bolter, I leave the gun off, and the backpack off. I leave off the backpack so that I can always get unobstructed access to the should pad for decals and such. Leaving the gun off gives me access to the chest eagle.

For missile launcher marines, I leave both arms off and paint them separately (since the missile launcher is attached to the arm already). So basically, I leave off the arms, shoulder pads, and backpacks. After painting them all separately, I glue them on. Before gluing the backpack on, I put on decals on to the shoulder pads. Gluing on the painted backpack is always the last thing I do. It just comes down to what's most convenient for you, depending on how you like to paint them. If I was freehanding the symbols, i'd probably get away with putting on the packs first, but I still think it would be easier to paint them with the packs off.

I think it's also worth noting that there's the nervousness aspect. There's this mentality among new painters of "if I mess up, I can never fix this" or they try to fix it and fuck it up more.

I think it's really important to remind yourself to just be patient. Mistakes will be made (you'll get too much paint on something, you put paint on something you didn't mean to, etc) by everyone, and a steady hand and patience helps reduce them and their effects. What matters is how you fix your mistakes.

For example, lets say you're painting a space marine bike, and you're painting the edge of the body with the rivets, and you get paint onto the bulk of the body because that strip is very thin. Instead of covering that one spot up with paint (which will result in an uneven coat of paint), paint a thin coat over the entire area to cover it up.

Or lets say you get paint somewhere that you REALLY can't fix or don't have the desire to fix. Quickly dab your brush in water, get rid of all the paint on the brush, then put the wet brush over the paint, and keep adding water in this way. Then take a paper towel and dry it off. There will still be some residue from the mistake color, but it will be far thinner and easier to handle.

And most importantly, remember: if it absolutely positively can't be fixed, it can still be fixed. Just soak it in 409 or Simple Green for a few hours, then scrub with a toothbrush, and start over.

Oh! Also, make sure to scrub your pewter models with either a toothbrush or lightly with steel wool. It'll even out the surface imperfections which make it hard to paint.

>>17348240
Yes, I very much agree. The problem is that when you are first starting out, you are subconsciously comparing your minis to the pictures on the box or in your codex, which are painted by experts with years of experience. It can shake peoples confidence when they can't replicate the results with their brush control and techniques.

The important thing to realize is that you don't have to paint like them. Nobody starts out that good. NOBODY. They got there through years of experience and painting many minis and learning from their trials. The painting part of the hobby should be fun - you are on a journey where you are learning new techniques and finding the style that fits you best. You will absolutely improve gradually over time. The more you paint, the better you'll get at it. The important thing to remember is that even if your minis aren't perfect, they are yours. You can take pride in the fact that you too are on a journey of improvement in this aspect of the hobby, and these minis are evidence of where you are. Later, when you look back at them, they will show you how far you have come.

It's all about patience, and having fun.

Another thing that i think needs to be said is 'fleshing out'.

Fleshing out a mini means one thing, make the mini eye-popping and beautiful. Thing is, most people don't understand why the mini that they spent 3 hours getting the shading correct on the trigger of the bolter simply doesn't stand out among other minis.

1) Contrast

The easiest way to make a mini pop out is to use contrast. It can be terrifying to dab orange on a black or gray mini, but the reward is well worth it. You need to have atleast TWO, preferably three "base" colors on your mini. Check out http://www.colorblender.com/. Helps you get a feel for color-matching, but don't be afraid to go outside the boundories. Try checking other people's work with that particular Chapter or base color and see what they did.

continued in next post.

Great thread.

Just a few pointers for when you are about to start taking the next step up in your painting game.

If youve read around youll see people recommend using Future floor polish and water mixture to thin youre paints. What it does is reduce the surface tension in the water so that it flows better on the mini. About 1:10 Future to water does the trick. It may make the model a little shinier than normal so you may want to use a matte spray to tone it down. Also when thinning I found that using distilled water instead of tap helped abit, but I have hard as hell water where Im from and cant drink from the tap without it being filtered.

2) Highlights and shadows

Good highlighting can make even a bad mini decent. In it's raw form, highlighting is emulating light on the mini. For base level, you can understand highlighting as anything that helps edges pop out on a mini. Using inks to darken crevices in your mini will make the rest of the mini stand out, since the eye is not interested in what it can't see, but in what i can. Adding any highlighting technique on it, like blacklining, paneling, drybrushing etc, will further advance the eye popping.

3) Dynamic range and coating

Color dynamic range means that the mini keeps a sense of cohesiveness along it's entire color palette. This one can be hard to explain, but you ever seen that one mini where that one pauldron or that one gun totally stood out from the rest of the mini? Detracted the view? That's what i mean about cohesiveness and dynamic range. Don't mistake this for lack of contrast, but think of it more like having the colors spread across the spectrum in a way where it doesn't detract and makes the mini "flow" nicely from one to the other.

By coat i mean polish/finish. They come in different types, from 'make my mini shiney' to 'make my mini dull', and while initially i would say just pick one or the other for an entire squad, later on you can mix and match, and even use different polishes for different areas of the mini. It does wonders and can make all the difference.

Now, that's pretty much all i can remember right now, but for short, even a simply-painted mini can come out looking professional with minimum of work if you fallow these simple principles.

If it 'pops' it's good.

>>17348627
Yes, I see what you mean. Personally I spray my marines with a matte spray seal after they are done, but I go back and paint on a gloss varnish onto the eye lenses with a brush. I guess that sorta fits with what you are talking about.

>>17348142

this!

Here's a tip that some people assume is common sense, but you might benefit from this if you are new to painting. It is best to keep old big brushes to use for your drybrushing, since it damages the brush. Use your older and worn out brushes for drybrushing. Also, if you like to make textured bases and use some PVA glue (Elmer's glue), use one of those old worn out brushes to paint the glue on. I put some glue onto the base, and then use the old brush to spread it around to evenly cover all of the area that I want the sand and other stuff to stick to. After this, always be sure to quickly wash off the brush in water to make sure that none of the glue dries on the brush - even your old brushes deserve some care. If you let the glue dry, the brush is completely ruined and can't be used again. A similar problem can happen if you forget to wash off paint. If you don't have any old brushes, you might get the cheapest brushes you can find to substitute for one.

Another thing to point out.

Earlier in the thread, mention was made of using water to thin acrylic paints, and paint thinner for enamels.

For those who don't know, acrylics are the typical paints used on miniatures of this size. All Citadel paints are acrylics. Enamel paints are like the Testors paints that people commonly use to paint airplane models and the like. You need special paint thinner to thin these. In fact, you usually "clean" and wash the brush off after use with the paint thinner and not just water when you use enamels.

The easiest way to tell if your paint is acrylic or enamel is just by the smell. Acrylic paints usually have no smell, or a very faint one (Citadel washes actually have a stronger smell as well, but they are an exception). Enamel paints and their paint thinner all have a strong, sharp smell.

Acrylic paints are much easier to deal with when painting models on the scale of typical wargames - they clean easier, and they don't destroy brushes as easily. The Enamels flow much better through airbrushes that people commonly use on large airplane models and the like. They also cover very well without multiple coats, but they tend to obscure small details. It is better to use enamels on an airplane model than to use it on your Space Marine or your Battlemech.

I think the main thing that most people will be working on once they get the paint thickness and application down is brush control. That's what will slowly and steadily begin to improve as you paint more, and will eventually allow you to do all kinds of cool details, like script on armor in 40k, or kill markings and numbers in Btech. It will also be the key to taking the next step and moving into highlighting. Brush control will help you a lot with freehanding as well, and after enough practice eventually some of us might become good enough to paint epic banners for command squads and such.

Now, here I'm just theorizing, but maybe a good way to practice brush control when you aren't painting is to practice writing and drawing things with a pencil or a marker or something? When you think about it, it seems that painting uses similar motions and if you can draw something with your pencil, you're almost to the point where you can paint it onto your banner. Maybe by practicing things like drawing straight lines or circles or curves, we can improve our brush control? Meh, I'm probably pulling this out of my ass, but who knows, it might work.