Friday, July 17, 2009

Some painting experiments

So I didn't get much painted yesterday but I did want to try two quick tests out.

Here is a Firewarrior. One I'll never use because of the grenade I'll never take. He's a spare now, a replacement has been painted and he is relegated to the bits box. I've been thinking if there is a way I could get a little more depth out of these models. The white is just so stark and has no shading at all. I thought maybe if I could come up with a quick plan to go over all my guys with a wash or something that might solve my problem. The first thing that came to mind was maybe trying a blue wash. So bitz boy gets back on the paint table.
So here he is after the blue wash. It was only about 5 minutes to do and very easy so it did fit the bill there. However:
1) The grey gun hilt now looks totally out of place, so likely I'd need to paint that also.
2) While the blue on blue doesn't look bad as a paint scheme it doesn't really go with my whole idea of the snow world Tau.
3) Looking at him makes me want to freshen my breath and grab some mouthwash.

Maybe a more washed down blue would help. Maybe a washed down ink just to fill in some lines and keep the white as the primary color. I don't know, maybe I'll just leave it alone and be happy the way they are.

The second project was getting the other plasma guns I needed done and I decided I would add a little color. For my marines I had been doing yellow with a green wash for the plasma effect.Here are two plasma guns (that still need touching up) but one is lacking the wash. The wash didn't come out quite as good as it did on the marines because there is no ridges or what not to really shade. Its not bad, and maybe I could add a little yellow lining to make it pop out. However as it stands I almost like the yellow better, I could just add a darker yellow ring around the 'base' to give some contrast.

What do you guys think about these experiments? Any preferences or suggestions?
Posted by at 1:53 PM
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1 comments:

  1. So I have a similar situation when using the white on my Eldar guys (Dire Avengers and Farseers).

    The way I've got around this is by using multiple watered down washes of white paint over the color I wanted underneath.

    So what I do is this. Base paint the white areas in white. Then water down the other color you want to use significantly. I go to about a 4 / 1 mix (4 water / 1 paint). Should be really watery. Apply the paint that you want the areas to be "shaded" in the color you want. On my Farseers head for example I used a dark khaki brown (for wraith bone) for my DA's I used a dark medium blue.

    Don't apply a lot at a time. Just around the accent areas you want. You don't want the paint to pool everywhere..just in the cracks or accent points you want it. If you have too much watery paint on your brush you'll also lose control (which is another thing the Raphael brushes I use do very well..control watery paint).

    After these dark areas dry its gonna look like ass. It will look like ink that's dried wrong. IT'S OK.

    Now what you do is water down white paint. You start with a 2 / 1 mix (or higher water) and you feather the edges of the colored areas with this mix. What you're doing here is creating a blending effect by using multiple layers. It sounds tedious but in an assembly line it actually goes quite fast. As you move closer to the center of the shades areas..you water the white paint down EVEN MORE. So what you get is a nice gradual shade effect because you're layering semi-transparent white paint over the color. When you do the shades with the lighter paint go over the entire whitened area and work your way in. You'll get a very nice blended finish here that looks really natural. Would work really well on the tau for accenting the armor pieces. Blue works really nicely..so does brown. I have a feeling red would look great too but haven't done this yet.

    In regards to the guns..one thing that I've found is that "subtle" blends really aren't worth the time and effort unless you're planning on competing in the Golden Demons. You're just not going to see them on the battlefield. So I suggest for the Green or Yellow look you want. GO DARK on the base color. For the green go with a deep hunter or forest green and work your way up to a yellow. For the yellow look go with a medium orange and work your way up to a really bright yellow. This way you get a great contrast or "edge" of color that implies energy and vibrancy. Exaggerating the shades really helps this work. 75% of your color will be the color you really want the piece to be in..but the dark base for the shade areas and the light highlight will give you a really nice sense of color and dispersion.
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