Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Has anyone got any tips for painting little white and silver stars on a black and or dark blue background. I'm starting out a Harlequin project and I want to place a few little stars here and there on the bodywork of the jetbikes and skimmers. Aside from painting a nice smooth background I've absolutely no idea where to start though.

Any help would be appreciated, but if someone could point me in the direction of a great how to article or video I'd be eternally thankful.

Stars how?

like a starry night mural or those super Mario stars.


because those starry night murals are done with an old brush or tooth brush with short bristles, take some paint with a bit of water, then you flick the brush to get small droplets landing all over the place.

as for Mario stars, you could try getting not super sticky stickers in that shape, paint it white first, then paint the dark background over it. then peal off the sticker. (not sure if this would work.)

 Desubot wrote:
Stars how?

like a starry night mural or those super Mario stars.


because those starry night murals are done with an old brush or tooth brush with short bristles, take some paint with a bit of water, then you flick the brush to get small droplets landing all over the place.

Yeah I want to be a little more precise than flicking the paint at the model, and I'm definitely going for a more realistic look than the Mario stars lol. The kind of thing I want is like the odd little pin prick shining stars here and there on the hull of the vessel.

I thought about doing a very small circle of grey paint and building it up from there with lighter shades of grey and white. But I'm not sure, maybe there's a better way?

Sounds like a pain.

though an image would help

Dab a small, solid bit of white or whatever color you want. The draw the edges out with a dry brush into whatever shape you want.

 Desubot wrote:
Sounds like a pain.

though an image would help

Yeah, the best example I can find is on Pinterest and it's hard to port over because that site is a bit of a bitch lol, but here's one I found on Facebook. https://m.facebook.com/madebyshizune/photos/pcb.1002574809764230/1002570973097947/?type=3&theater This dude has done some really nice effects with his Harlies, and the stars he's used would be the kind of thing I'd be going for, but probably more sparsely and on a darker background.

You're right though it does sound a bit of a pain lol


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Munga wrote:
Dab a small, solid bit of white or whatever color you want. The draw the edges out with a dry brush into whatever shape you want.

That probably sounds like the way to go. I was hoping there'd be some nice YouTube videos of someone doing a step by step or something. I know it's pretty niche though. Thanks though guys, I know I haven't described this in the best of terms.

It depends how big the stars are going to be, a lot of star scapes are done exactly how Desubot suggested, flick white paint off a stiff bristled brush on to the model, or put some paint on a soft hairy brush and use an airbrush to blow paint off the hairy brush in a more controlled manner. You can use a couple of different greys to create duller stars.

That creates the dots, then you go around with a hairy brush and add some detail to the larger dots, use some washes and filters to add some contrast between the dots so they aren't all pure white and use an airbrush (maybe with the help of masks) to create the starry cloud effect or create nebulae and add a haze effect to some of the larger stars.

You can then use circular masks to create nearer planets with an airbrush.

Not sure if this helps but here are some stars I did recently. I did it by airbrushing a small dot and using a thinned down white on a very thin brush to draw out streaks at random (you can also use an airbrush template with a + patterrn hole cut out to but I didn't have one).

The clouds are done by airbrushing along the side of a cut out green scrubber (Tip I learned from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jExEMMsQlY)

If you want smaller stars though like a starfield then you might be better just dotting them on by hand.

Edit:Ugh damn facebook tiny resolution images. I can maybe upload a higher res version when I get home if you want but maybe these stars are too big for your needs.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:It depends how big the stars are going to be, a lot of star scapes are done exactly how Desubot suggested, flick white paint off a stiff bristled brush on to the model, or put some paint on a soft hairy brush and use an airbrush to blow paint off the hairy brush in a more controlled manner. You can use a couple of different greys to create duller stars.

That creates the dots, then you go around with a hairy brush and add some detail to the larger dots, use some washes and filters to add some contrast between the dots so they aren't all pure white and use an airbrush (maybe with the help of masks) to create the starry cloud effect or create nebulae and add a haze effect to some of the larger stars.

You can then use circular masks to create nearer planets with an airbrush.

Ok thanks, I guess as with everything trial and error and practice makes perfect. I think maybe I need to pick up some trash models off eBay and do some test pieces to see what I can come up with or maybe finally paint that Or gorkamorka war buggy I've had lying around since 1998 and try it on that!

wtnind wrote:Not sure if this helps but here are some stars I did recently. I did it by airbrushing a small dot and using a thinned down white on a very thin brush to draw out streaks at random (you can also use an airbrush template with a + patterrn hole cut out to but I didn't have one).

The clouds are done by airbrushing along the side of a cut out green scrubber (Tip I learned from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jExEMMsQlY)

If you want smaller stars though like a starfield then you might be better just dotting them on by hand.

Edit:Ugh damn facebook tiny resolution images. I can maybe upload a higher res version when I get home if you want but maybe these stars are too big for your needs.

That's some amazing work, I'd love to see the higher res images, mainly because I want to have a nose at them, but they look beautiful. Thanks. If I'm honest I'm a bit of novice with the airbrush, and have had really poor results when using templates, but again practice will probably get me there in the end. I can make a Chimera look rusted to feth and do camo really nicely. But I'm not sure I'd be able to do anything as precise as stars with it. I'm going to be pushing myself by doing these Harlequin patterns I think. What I want to do on the Star Weaver/ Void Weaver is a fading colour from front to back, then mask off diamond patterns across the hulk and do a different fade of darker colours with maybe an inky blue black to a lighter blue at the front. Then on the darker diamonds towards the rear I will try and paint in these nice little stars and maybe a celestial object here and there if I'm feeling really brave.

I'm honestly used to painting drab military things like Marines and Guardsmen. I've always looked at Eldar and Harlequins with a little bit of envy and ambition. I've had the Harly models for months, I've just been waiting for the right spark to start painting them. The release of Death Masque has kind of tipped me over the edge.

Have a look around the interwebs and youtube, some people have made tutorials on how to do various space scenes including stars.

If you're a bit of a novice with an airbrush and templates, starry skies are probably a good place to practice because precision isn't required. The camo patterns on a military vehicle in some ways are harder because they require a flawless execution.

If you're using an airbrush you can intentionally make it splutter, which can give you some starry looks.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnB3d-p3du0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TUWXBYArw5E

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yxXQkWHcF2I

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ERI7PAKqvLs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eVNefj5SGc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ne1MZtaNBE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udZHU3Otpvk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GN3OvBnXxpI

An interesting way i saw someone paint a DA decal, which could be applied to a star, is just paint a circle, then paint with your armor color to remove the white to form a star. might be the best way.

Or, sketch it with a pencil, not joking, then paint it in.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
Have a look around the interwebs and youtube, some people have made tutorials on how to do various space scenes including stars.

If you're a bit of a novice with an airbrush and templates, starry skies are probably a good place to practice because precision isn't required. The camo patterns on a military vehicle in some ways are harder because they require a flawless execution.

If you're using an airbrush you can intentionally make it splutter, which can give you some starry looks.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnB3d-p3du0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TUWXBYArw5E

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yxXQkWHcF2I

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ERI7PAKqvLs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eVNefj5SGc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ne1MZtaNBE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udZHU3Otpvk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GN3OvBnXxpI

Thanks for the links Skink, my Google fu was very weak on this subject lol I hadn't actually considered broadening the search to other areas like art and decorating, but there's actually some great tips in there thanks. And some great ideas that I'm actually thinking of adding to what I already have...I'm already thinking of sticking in a couple of nebulas now too

 General Kroll wrote:

That's some amazing work, I'd love to see the higher res images, mainly because I want to have a nose at them, but they look beautiful.

Thanks for the compliment, heres some higher res images. I'm not amazing with the airbrush but stars are pretty forgiving as long as you can get the flow of the airbrush gradual and dont get any splatter. And start the spray 100% on the stencil before gradually allowing the stream to go on the model.

They're gorgeous! I do suffer a bit with splatter sometimes on my airbrush. Is that all down to the air pressure then? I clean the brush like a man possessed and I still get it giving me a splatter when I first fire off a burst of paint now and then, it can be a right pain.

I think I've found my Weekend project...airbrush practice and star practice

 General Kroll wrote:
They're gorgeous! I do suffer a bit with splatter sometimes on my airbrush. Is that all down to the air pressure then? I clean the brush like a man possessed and I still get it giving me a splatter when I first fire off a burst of paint now and then, it can be a right pain.

I think I've found my Weekend project...airbrush practice and star practice

Some of the things I've noticed that cause problems are:

1. paint being too thinned down and/or pulling back too far on the trigger so it spurts or starts to pool on the model
2. you can be too vigerous with the cleaning when I started I broke 2 nozzels, they started being worse at spraying and when I inspected they had tiny cracks in the end of the nozzle
3. when your about to spray an area of the model test out the spray on some paper to see what speed it is comming out and if theres any splatter.
4. oh and get an ultrasonic cleaner they are super cheap and great. I also use some lube on the needle afterwards so it slides easily

wtnind wrote:

 General Kroll wrote:
They're gorgeous! I do suffer a bit with splatter sometimes on my airbrush. Is that all down to the air pressure then? I clean the brush like a man possessed and I still get it giving me a splatter when I first fire off a burst of paint now and then, it can be a right pain.

I think I've found my Weekend project...airbrush practice and star practice

Some of the things I've noticed that cause problems are:

1. paint being too thinned down and/or pulling back too far on the trigger so it spurts or starts to pool on the model
2. you can be too vigerous with the cleaning when I started I broke 2 nozzels, they started being worse at spraying and when I inspected they had tiny cracks in the end of the nozzle
3. when your about to spray an area of the model test out the spray on some paper to see what speed it is comming out and if theres any splatter.
4. oh and get an ultrasonic cleaner they are super cheap and great. I also use some lube on the needle afterwards so it slides easily

Thanks for the tips