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I have lately stumbled on a game at my FLGS where a new face was playing with an army of entirely shiny space marines. Needless to say, the army was overwhelmingly good looking. But... not so much up close. If you were to pick up one of them, you realise sloppy lumps and brush strokes all over the place.

The question is, have shiny paints been deemed as inferior by pure statistics, or is he just an impatient painter?
Does gloss give better/worse effects than accrylics? Are there other (better) ways? What to do to make it look best and not leave any brush strokes, grains, lumps or the such? Does it make sense to drybrush over that? Anything else I should know?

Wow, lots of questions.

Acrylics generally come as a matte finish. There are four major grades of finish:

1) Flat - Almost entirely non-reflective
2) Matte - Lightly reflective
3) Satin - Moderately reflective
4) Gloss - Highly reflective

It sounds like your friend sealed his models with a clear gloss. This typically gives a very shiney look and smooth feeling to the model (almost oily in some cases). It won't really hide defects on close examination. I've used a brush-on gloss for watery effects and some metallics.

High gloss models will tend to photograph poorly due to the amount of light reflected. It's also typically considered inferior, because very little naturally has a high gloss to it.

"Does gloss give better/worse effects than acrylics?"

Gloss is different than acrylics per above. Paints that tend to be glossy are things like enamels (Testor's paints).

"Are there other (better) ways?"

It all depends on the effect you want.

"What to do to make it look best and not leave any brush strokes, grains, lumps, or the such?"

1) Make sure your model is clean and smooth before you prime. Any imperfections in the model will become accented once you paint. Things like mold lines that wouldn't be obvious prior to painting become VERY obvious once you start to drybrush or use washes.

2) Thin your paints! It may take several coats, but using thinner paints is key to getting a nice flat (as opposed to textured) coat.

3) Use good quality brushes. They don't have to be W&N Series 7, but you want a brush that has a decently thick head and comes to a sharp point. I would recommend a natural sable over synthetics, but I use both.

4) Learn to load your brushes correctly. When you thin your paint considerably, if you load the brush and there is a lot of paint, the first time you touch it to something paint will come gushing out. You don't want this, you want the brush to have the paint come out more like ink from an ink pen. If you look at youtube videos of tutorials, you'll notice some painters have dabs of paint on their finger or thumb nails. This is from taping the brush to draw off excess paint.

5) Use the right primer color. If you want brighter models, prime white. If you want darker models, prime black. You can also prime in the color the majority if your models will be, which can be helpful for armies such as Space Marines. For black or white, I highly recommend Krylon's Flat Black/White Primer. You can get this at Wally World for about $3-4 per can, and it has a directional nozzle.

"Does it make sense to drybrush over that?"

No. The idea behind drybrushing is that with very little paint on the brush, what is there will catch and only be applied to raised surfaces. If you drybrush over a textured surface, you'll bring out the texture of the surface. This is what makes drybrushing chainmail so effective.

"Anything else I should know?"

Lots! =p

This is a Semi Gloss spray on lacquer over coat.

Heffling wrote:Wow, lots of questions.

Acrylics generally come as a matte finish. There are four major grades of finish:

1) Flat - Almost entirely non-reflective
2) Matte - Lightly reflective
3) Satin - Moderately reflective
4) Gloss - Highly reflective

It sounds like your friend sealed his models with a clear gloss. This typically gives a very shiney look and smooth feeling to the model (almost oily in some cases). It won't really hide defects on close examination. I've used a brush-on gloss for watery effects and some metallics.

High gloss models will tend to photograph poorly due to the amount of light reflected. It's also typically considered inferior, because very little naturally has a high gloss to it.

"Does gloss give better/worse effects than acrylics?"

Gloss is different than acrylics per above. Paints that tend to be glossy are things like enamels (Testor's paints).

"Are there other (better) ways?"

It all depends on the effect you want.

"What to do to make it look best and not leave any brush strokes, grains, lumps, or the such?"

1) Make sure your model is clean and smooth before you prime. Any imperfections in the model will become accented once you paint. Things like mold lines that wouldn't be obvious prior to painting become VERY obvious once you start to drybrush or use washes.

2) Thin your paints! It may take several coats, but using thinner paints is key to getting a nice flat (as opposed to textured) coat.

3) Use good quality brushes. They don't have to be W&N Series 7, but you want a brush that has a decently thick head and comes to a sharp point. I would recommend a natural sable over synthetics, but I use both.

4) Learn to load your brushes correctly. When you thin your paint considerably, if you load the brush and there is a lot of paint, the first time you touch it to something paint will come gushing out. You don't want this, you want the brush to have the paint come out more like ink from an ink pen. If you look at youtube videos of tutorials, you'll notice some painters have dabs of paint on their finger or thumb nails. This is from taping the brush to draw off excess paint.

5) Use the right primer color. If you want brighter models, prime white. If you want darker models, prime black. You can also prime in the color the majority if your models will be, which can be helpful for armies such as Space Marines. For black or white, I highly recommend Krylon's Flat Black/White Primer. You can get this at Wally World for about $3-4 per can, and it has a directional nozzle.

"Does it make sense to drybrush over that?"

No. The idea behind drybrushing is that with very little paint on the brush, what is there will catch and only be applied to raised surfaces. If you drybrush over a textured surface, you'll bring out the texture of the surface. This is what makes drybrushing chainmail so effective.

"Anything else I should know?"

Lots! =p

Thanks for the tips! Quite a lot of them in there.

If you can be bothered, I really could use some opinions on my army colour scheme so far. I suppose shinyness does solve one problem of the cadian armour being the same colour as the cloth areas, while not changing too much of what I'm hoping for (plus, there's a lot of shinyness in the original). Find out what the heck I'm talking about in the link down there in the signature


Also, how would I paint my leman russes to get the effect as seen on the picture? I'm thinking acryllic paints would be best, but it still doesn't stop it from being a tough one.