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Bugs: Recent Topics Paging, Uploading Images & Preview (11 Dec 2020)

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× Painting Minis, Print & Play and Other Creative Type Stuff.

Need advice on getting into mini painting

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17 Oct 2017 19:47 #255871 by Vlad
This is the best advice on starting miniature painting that I've read. Barnes, you need to make it into an article.
Agreed with everything here.
And, more specifically, Reaper Basic kit is everything you need to do basic tabletop quality painting for D&D.

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18 Oct 2017 03:05 #255883 by __
yeah thanks everyone for the feedback, and especially Michael, that was awesome, especially re: the kids. I would love to let my 7 year old have a crack at it with me.

Just a quick question which I guess is more economy based really, but say you base coat a figure, then do a wash (which makes everything darker), would you drybrush /highlight in the base colour again (since that will now be lighter than the base under the wash) or do you still need to take a lighter shade. I am going to guess the base coat itself will look brighter on top of the wash than under it, and thus, for simple minis a single pot of colour is OK (not including any small detail bits).

I was thinking for those D&DAS minis that less is more when it comes to colours anyway, but its not always easy to think what colours to use, especially on some of the heros which have lots of small fiddly bits and no obvious big areas you could base a colour around.
Then, check out this miniature cultist which seems like it would be super easy to basecoat a colour, use an offwhite for the skulls, wash and then highlight or dry brush, but do you see the hanging chain and bead on the back, that thread round the neck is insanely thin, and its stuff like that which is very off putting, like how the hell are you supposed to tackle that? (I wondered if you just try to do some kind of weird dry brushing over it then repaint the cloak base colour to fix up any dry brush colour which went onto there)


I will go and get that reaper starter kit if its available here in Europe, thanks for the heads up on that.

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18 Oct 2017 04:41 #255890 by Sevej
After wash, whether you want to put on the original color or a lighter shade, it all depends on what kind of look do you want. Putting the original color is perfectly fine, if it's the color you want to be, and you are right it will be brighter over the washes. I think Mr. White uses this technique extensively. Putting a lighter shade will provide greater contrast, in case you want something to pop out more. It all depends on the look you want. Try putting the original color first, leave it dry (wet paint looks brighter), and see whether you like it or not. You can always have lighter drybrush of brighter color. Going from light to dark is a little more hassle.

Painting the string is not too hard, considering two things:
1. It's a raised detail. Meaning, try *light brushing* until the raised detail catch your brush. make sure your brush isn't over loaded, and it's easier with thicker paint.
2. If you mess up, remember... it's much easier to NOT PAINT a fine line than to PAINT a fine line. Fix it with black.

So, in short, your supposition is correct.

Remember, models have details. Let the details catch your brush.
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18 Oct 2017 05:19 - 18 Oct 2017 05:27 #255893 by __
Great, thanks Seve

sort of an aside, but 2 things I wondered

- I get that prepaints are expensive (and awful, I saw the premium Tomb of Annihilation and most of them look terrible - though Heroscape had some nicer ones), but why dont more companies at least do some kind of monochrome primed minis? The D&DAS minis for example would already look better if spray primed in black or something, just wonder if any company ever did that?

- why are the D&DAS models (some of them) so full of messy small detail thats not needed. A lot of online tutorials show the GW space marines which look amazing but seem super easy, ie they have some detail but also some larger flatter areas too, they look great just in a base coat and wash! I don't get why especially the hero minis here are full of intricate (but messy) little bits instead of having chunkier, more simple type shapes and areas that would also stand out more and be easier to paint as well. Its like they are designed to be the opposite of how they should (ie it must take time and effort to add all those details,which dont show up nicely in those models and are a pain to get at, so why bother?)


I suppose here was a decent stab


but it seems like it would have been better with a slightly chunkier, cleaner less busy sculpt for some of them, I guess you can always buy your own minis. I am a little bit tempted to just use primary player colour schemes for the heroes i.e. just one colour per hero and only paint the monsters with "proper" colours

Now I just have to temper my excitement about actually trying to paint some minis and hoping they will look good with the crushing reality of remembering the last time I painted a mini, about 35 years ago and it basically being those metal minis covered in huge gloopy globs of oily type paint applied with what seemed to be a foot wide shovel. haha. Happy days.
Last edit: 18 Oct 2017 05:27 by __.
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18 Oct 2017 06:55 - 18 Oct 2017 07:51 #255897 by __
PS
what is the most effective way to find individual minis. Lets say I wanted to replace the D&DAS heroes with generic fighter/wizard/cleric/rogue/paladin etc, but trying to get better quality, chunkier, less unnecessary detailed models, do you have preferred suppliers, and is there any easy way to find models by type? (I have nightmare memories of trawling through Troll and Toads online store for random Heroclix superhero minis 100 minis at a time through about 50 pages).


by the way, I caught this

while reading about this new "Glossy" nuln oil, and it was a good highlight of the beginner freakout problem, because to my eyes, at that point in the video when he slapped the wash on, especially at the front cloth under the belt, it actually looked like shit, and I guess thats an experience thing to know how things "will" look once dried and finished. I guarantee if I put a wash on a model and it looked like that part there, I would assume I'd messed it up and panic, probably just wash it all off and start over.
Last edit: 18 Oct 2017 07:51 by __.

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18 Oct 2017 14:44 #255930 by Vlad
For raised details there is also a technique (I believe called overbrushing). Pick a small brush, load it with not too much paint and then flatten the bristles on both sides on a paper towel, so the brush looks flat. Then go over the details with it, so the paint will catch only the raised surfaces.

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19 Oct 2017 15:37 #256012 by Michael Barnes
HA! You see, the thing is, even the best-painted models I think go through the "oh shit I fucked this up" stage. Especially in the basecoating. I just did a group of 40k Scions in my Cadian color scheme and during the basecoating I just about threw the models in the trash and bought another box. But once I got past the wash and into detailing (at which point I was still hovering over the trash can), they turned OK. Not great, because I think those models are sort of difficult, but in line with the rest of my tabletop/"tabletop plus" goal.

The D&DAS minis, like most board game miniatures, are really pretty bad. They are poorly sculpted and poorly cast, which is why you have all of that WTF muddy detail. The problem is the sculpts were probably actually fine and the mold was probably fine...but then you add lowest bid Chinese manufacturing and materials into the mix and you get that slurry of sloppy details. The CMON figures are REALLY bad about this. I painted some of Black Plague, and the animals and zombies were fine. But the heroes had WAY more detail than the miniatures could support at that level of quality. So there were belts (?), pouches (??) and other accessories (???) that sort of disappeared even after just the primer coat.

The problem with "pre-primed" miniatures is pretty simple. If they did that, they could not sell them as "toys" in most countries because most miniatures primers would not be considered to be safe for a kid to put in their mouth. The Reaper Bones figures (like the ones in the Learn to Paint kit) are a slightly different plastic than the usual polystyrene, and you can paint right over it. The detail is garbage, but they are easy to deal with.

With figures like that, you are correct that sometimes the best approach is to just put a couple of base colors on and then wash.

I was thinking for those D&DAS minis that less is more when it comes to colours anyway, but its not always easy to think what colours to use, especially on some of the heros which have lots of small fiddly bits and no obvious big areas you could base a colour around.

This is sort of an unspoken, important skill about miniature painting. Color selection is so important. Once again, go look at some painted Warhammer minis on eBay to see why. You'll see all kinds of HORRENDOUS color choices- I have no idea what would drive someone to paint a Tyranid fluorescent yellow and red with silver claws, but it's out there. Contrast that with the GW photos, where they have carefully selected color schemes that look great together.

Less is sometimes more, and when you have 100+ paint colors to choose from, you tend to reach for a new color at times when you don't need to. What I like to do is when I am painting something, I set up a palette box. In it, I have all of the colors that work together for that figure or figures and nothing else. I will only use "in palette" colors on something, and I will try to creatively use those colors to add highlight, points of interest, and detail. For example, with Tyranids, they are Leviathan fleet so they have a cream/bone skin tone, purple carapaces, skin-colored organs/blobby stuff, dark red weapons, and anything like teeth or claws is dark gray. I follow those rules to the tee on every model, so that they always look good and I have just five colors there. But there is a sixth. I use a bright green for eyes, poison sacs, and any other kind of small detail that I want to stand out. The color still works precisely with that core palette. So when you paint one of the D&D heroes for example, establish a palette like that. If you're doing the elf ranger for example, set up a hair and skin color, a color for all of the cloth, a color for all of the leather, a metal you like for anything metallic, and maybe a contrast color in case there is something where you can apply that. Don't think you have to have 20 colors on everything for it to look good.

Then, check out this miniature cultist which seems like it would be super easy to basecoat a colour, use an offwhite for the skulls, wash and then highlight or dry brush, but do you see the hanging chain and bead on the back, that thread round the neck is insanely thin, and its stuff like that which is very off putting, like how the hell are you supposed to tackle that? (I wondered if you just try to do some kind of weird dry brushing over it then repaint the cloak base colour to fix up any dry brush colour which went onto there)

Another important, unspoken skill is learning the order in which to paint things...another is knowing when it is totally OK to paint over something at an early step and then come back to finish it later. SO like that thread, Sevej gave good advice on that. With basecoating, don't worry so much about avoiding areas- just paint for full coverage and then neaten it up later. If you watch some of the GW beginner's tutorials, they will have you completely cover a model in a base color. THEN you go back and do the fine detail.

"Let the detail catch the brush" is great advice- but you have to learn how to have a feel that. You will be surprised as you get better how easy some things like that chain are later on. And how you learn tricks to make stuff like that easier.
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19 Oct 2017 16:49 #256017 by __
awesome, I ordered the Reaper kit so I will update with the gory details later

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19 Oct 2017 22:06 #256024 by blatz
I’m a huge fan of painting over the base colors with the same paint after the wash. Then I add a lighter color for the raised areas and third color to pick out hard edges. That’s it. You don’t need to work up a hundred shades of highlighting to get a model that’s going to look great up close as well as on the table.

Also, I think Barnes nailed it about color selection. Good colors are more important than meticulous painting every day. If you have not seen it yet, GW makes an app for its paint line. You can pick a color and it will suggest the right base, layer, and highlight to get the look you want. I read you can even take a picture of something and it will match the colors to their paints.
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