Ok, I know nothing about miniature painting, but I know some of you guys who play Warhammer and the like are amazing at this kind of stuff, so give a newbie a hand.
I recently purchased the board game Descent . This amazing game comes with like 80 plastic miniatures, all unpainted. I’ve always wanted to give miniature painting a shot, so I guess now would be the time to do it.
I went to the local gaming store, and they sold me a can of “Skull White” base spraypaint by Gamesworkshop. They lacked a good multi-pack of paint colors, so I then went to meijer and purchased a cheap set of acrylic model paints. I also purchased some cheap nylon brushes. Upon opening both items, I discover that the paint is crap and the brushes are going to fray after about one use. I mean, I kind of expected that, but dammit I’m impatient and didn’t want to go home empty handed.
So far I have spraypainted a goblin and a skeleton from my old copy of HeroQuest. I’d like to get a handle on things before trying the more detailed Descent miniatures. First I sanded each down with a nailfile. I then gave each side a light but solid coat, and then moved them with tweezers and sprayed the tops and bottoms for good measure. They seem like the turned out OK. I mean, they are white, so the can didn’t lie. How long does acrylic spray paint need to dry?
Am I on the right track? Can you guys recommend some good paint, instead of this cheap crap I picked up? How about brushes? Any random tips? Links to online order stores would be helpful.
Well, it’s expensive, but I’ve been most pleased with those tiny little pots of paint you get from Citadel that are just for that. I used to do a lot of painting back in college, and then didn’t touch it for years until we got the Doom boardgame, which screams for painting. Learning a few very simple techniques can really make a quickly, easily painted figure look awesome - look for online tutorials on drybrushing and washes.
ETA - you really at least need miniature paints for metallic colors, IMHO.
the Citadel paints, though the cost is unfortunate, really do seem to be the best for this sort of thing, it’s what they’re designed for. As it happens, you can occasionally get by with standard acrylic paints, but the Citadel ones are really good. Pick up some inks too, those are great for detailing.
Your spraypainting technique for priming sounds good. I personally use a cardboard box as a spray booth, and a cheap, plastic lazy susan. I put the miniatures on the lazy susan, spray one side, rotate the lazy susan 90 degrees, spray again, etc., until I’m back where I started. This way I don’t have to touch the figures whle wet in order to reposition them. You’re correct in that you want light coats on the primer - it shouldn’t obscure the detail.
I usually let sprayed figures dry for 24 hours before trying to paint them, but that’s probably excessive.
The Citadel paints are pretty good. I also use the Vallejo Game Color paints, which are perhaps slightly better. Citadel paints had a problem for a few years of drying out far too fast (they opted for style over efficiency in their bottle design). They’ve redesigned the bottles and now the paints last much longer.
You’ll have to invest in at least a half-decent set of brushes. Try looking at brushes in an art-supply store rather than a craft store.
http://www.brushthralls.com/ Has a lot of painting tutorials and tips, though they place an emphasis on painting Warmachine models from Privateer Press.
I’m not sure why they don’t sell their paint in their online store, but Privateer Press has their own line of acrylic paint. It’s all I’ve used so far for miniatures, so I can’t really compare it to other brands, but it covers really well, even if you need to water it down slightly. If you see their models being sold in a gaming store, the paint should be nearby.
Unfortunately I’m pretty new at mini painting, too, so I don’t have anything more than that. My personal preference is black primer, though. I like my models a little darker (dirtier looking, I guess), and the little detailed nooks are too bright if I use white.
I mainly paint lead miniatures for old-school role-playing games. I typically use wax to attach the figure to the end of a small, square rod (leftover from woodworking). This gives me a nice handle, and the piece will still stand on it’s own.
I use 2/0 to 5/0 sable brushes, and mainly use Testors enamel model paints. My models are… colorful, rather than realistic.
Ack! Painting! The bane of my wargaming existence. I usually paint to minimum tourney standards for my general troops but I will attempt to do better with my more elaborate character models. Citadel paints do seem to work best, though I wish something less expensive would do… like… I don’t know, molten gold. Nice brushes are key, I feel… I also invested in a lighted magnifying glass on an articulated arm that helps for some detail work. Happy painting. :>
One of the girls in my group is actually painting Descent models at the moment. She uses Cidadel paints, and they turn out fine.
And, to my knowledge, there are several different “starter paint sets” available from GW - either a straight up sett of ten or so colors, or either of the Scull Pass/Macragge boxes.
I’d also recomend a box of Foundation Paints, as the thicker paint for base layers really saves some stress later on (the only way to make yellow paint look like anything but piss). If you don’t want to spring for the box, then trust me - get a single pot of Talarn Flesh. You’ll thank me later.
You don’t need citadel brushes, but you do need relatively good quality brushes. Ask at a hobby/paint suply store. However, the easiest thing by far is just to buy two brushes from GW - Fine Detail and Small Drybrush. You don’t need more than that, though with larger models, you could find a good medium sized flat brush handy as well (don’t by the flat brushes from GW, they aren’t as good as they could be)
You might also want to experiment with black basecoat for some models, but that comes later.
I spent a whole summer one year painting figures gotten for free from my stepdad’s hobby store and I learned two important things:
It’s not as hard as it looks. It’s actually much harder to paint large things than small ones, since mistakes on something an inch tall are easy to pass off, and
Learning effective “wash” techniques really, really pays off on the finished product.
Are your figures resin or lead? I have to say I liked the resin ones much better than the lead ones.
The good thing about Foundation Paints IME is that you don’t even need to do an undercoat (at least for the darker ones,) since it sticks so well with a relatively light coat, even when watered down a LITTLE.
Oddly enough, I am in the middle of painting Battlelore figs partially with Tallarn Flesh, but I haven’t finished one yet so I don’t know how they’ll come out.
What helped me with detail work is a magnifing glass on a stand.
Holding the figure in a small clamp where it wont shake or move helped me. Then I tried something totally different. I put a glob of paint on the brush and clamped it. Then I dabbed the figure onto the brush.
Well, so far the skin sections of six goblins turned out pretty good. I initially globbed the paint too much on the first one, so I frantically began rubbing it with a paper napkin in the hopes of getting enough paint off to start over. To my pleasant surprise, the figure ended up a faded gray/green color that works really well for goblin skin, so beginners luck on that one I suppose.
The HeroQuest set I am going for the white basecoat because I want them to be a bit brighter than most (being a more kid-friendly game and all). The Descent set, definitely going to need to try the black basecoat.
What’s a good mid-range paint? Testors doesn’t water down and yet it globs. Also, the jars are near-impossible to get just a few drops out of to get the right color of paint. However I don’t think I need the most expensive best-of-the-best paint yet, as my artistic skill needs some work.
Geez, I’m going to have to dig out that digital camera so I can post pictures. This is fun!
I use different primers for different goals. If the fig is going to be predominantly bright, I use white primer. A dark fig is going to be primed black and medium range figs are going to be primed gray. When in doubt, though, I go with white since black goes over white easier than the other way around.
I also recommend foundation paints. They really save me a lot of time.
Absolutely post pics. The paints that I used were the Citadel paints, they’re really the best and if you want pride in your end result, always use the best materials you can get your hands on.
Man, this thread has got me wanting to do some figures. There’s a Games Workshop store right down the road from me (that has a 8 foot tall Space Marine on the front walk during business hours which gives me all sorts of fits of desire) and I’ve resisted stopping in to “check it out” because just driving past gets my credit cards all hot and bothered.
Lucky begger! We left Seattle (and its 4 GW stores, plus multiple independent retailers) to move back to Indianapolis a few months ago. There are only a couple of stores in this area that sell GW stuff.
The last one around here was finally run into the ground a few weeks ago by the jerk who ran it. And it was pretty crappy for the last few years it was open.
There’s tournament standards for minatures? I grew up painting D&D minatures, but never played the game. It was an extension of my plastic modeling. I don’t do much painting anymore, but one of the basic lessons I learned over the years is prep work is vital to good results. I too allow at least 24 hours for the primer to cure, not just dry. The minute I felt like I was rushing a project to see the end result, I forced myself to walk away to do something else. I found that for me, the process of painting was the fun part, not the end product. Coming up with new techniques to achieve effects was, for me, the best part of the hobby.
I’m a big fan of dry brushing. Washes followed by drybrushing can give great results. Multiple, thin coats are the way to go. If I had to paint dozens of figures, airbrush as much as possible, then go back for details. Paint your lightest color first then lay on darker colors, regardless of what is the “outer” layer. I hate painting things white or yellow, so for a challenge my last project was a 3" high skeleton soldier - turned out pretty good, IMO.
I painted lead figures and favor enamels over acrylics. I felt I had more control over the paint consistency using thinner versus water. Regardless of your medium, SEAL that painjob with multiple coats of sealant. They make brush-applied gloss and flat coats that might work better for different “surfaces” on your figure (cloth v. flesh). Man, I need to break out the paints one of these days.
