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.

Paintedfigs offer a much better paintjob for $3. It's not spectacular, but at least they thin their paints.

Hell, I offer a better paint job for $4 a model (granted its and extra dollar a fig, but you get a shaded and highlighted fig for that extra dollar, and I can crack them out like nobodies business).

Blargag but can you do 8 per squad ? the offer is 3 per model or 8 a squad. I just think is too cheap to be true and would like someone to vouch for him before i invest. and offering your service in someone else thread is kind of highjacking him. Blargag if you want to offer your services i would be interested in seeing you post a thread with your rates and work on it though. i am with some of the other posters , i don't have the time or skills and want to put something on the table other then primer troops with painted guns. granted i am new and just starting but i can already tell i do not like the painting part of the game.

In all rights he is doing real well. He is at least a 4 on a 1to10 scale 10 being god like. That said he paints better then me. Id pay his prices............if i had the cash. Im with others though when it comes to references. I need solid proof my troops are coming home, with no one left behind. I think his biggest problem is not paint jobs its picture taking. Im a pro and its all about lighting and close ups.

if i am going to pay any sort of price for painting. ON TOP of the ridiculous price for the models... i sure as hell be getting a better paint job than that. even for 8 bucks per squad.

While I wouldn't let someone else paint my miniatures simply because I don't want my army to be painted by anyone other than myself, I would direct some of my locals to your service.

I grind my teeth seeing unpainted or black primed models at the local tourneys (the main reason I don't participate is my own army isn't finished) and those boys could use an affordable, reliable service.

You might want to ask some of the pro painters here for some advice on business practices for things like shipping and terms of payment, how to prepare for expected and unexpected delays, problem customers and so on.

Gwar! wrote:Paintedfigs offer a much better paintjob for $3. It's not spectacular, but at least they thin their paints.

The dude's in Sri Lanka, so $3 is a good chunk of change, comparatively, and shipping rates there and back are harsh; you're really looking at about $5 per infantry fig.

http://paintedfigs.com/howsocheap.html

Seriously. We paint out of Sri Lanka, and everything here is a whole lot cheaper than in the West. The average monthly income here is just $128. In the capital Colombo, it's up to just $210.

Expecting any Western Painter to compete against that is stupid.



OP: you DO need to work on your photos...and badly. Try here:

Mini Photography: Backdrop
Mini Photography: Lighting
Mini Photography: Camera

So what? And they also have a Shipping hub in the US, so you pay US to US shipping rates and no more.

C'mon guys cut the guy some slack. He is offering a service. Either you want to use or you don't.

Tearing him down for what he is offering not only makes you look like a jackass, but potentially any lurkers or members will think twice about posting with their services. That makes us all look bad as members of dakka <steps down>

Currently nothing on ebay from ya.

phiasco wrote:if i am going to pay any sort of price for painting. ON TOP of the ridiculous price for the models... i sure as hell be getting a better paint job than that. even for 8 bucks per squad.

I'll be happy to overcharge you for a better than average paint job, read 7 on a scale of 10.. I fyou are still interested in that, please feel free to pm me..

(oh yeah forgot the devil smile for a bit o' sarcasm)

If you don't Like his painting or Prices then don't post! Especially if you have not used his service.

Its rude to insult a person that is trying to offer a service . While you may not like what he has to offer, you can show that respectfully by not partaking of it.


I love this here:

Paintedfigs offer a much better paintjob for $3. It's not spectacular, but at least they thin their paints.

When is it ok to post an add for a competitor on someones forum?

How is being Honest and not sugarcoating it being rude?

It seems people today have skin of ricepaper and any sort of truthful criticism is considered rude and bad.

Wait what? Competitor? Dakka have a painting Service? Why was I not informed?! And its ok to tell people they can get a much better service for the same price. It's called "helping people to not get ripped off"

Gwar! wrote:How is being Honest and not sugarcoating it being rude?

It seems people today have skin of ricepaper and any sort of truthful criticism is considered rude and bad.

Wait what? Competitor? Dakka have a painting Service? Why was I not informed?! And its ok to tell people they can get a much better service for the same price. It's called "helping people to not get ripped off"

People are allowed to get ripped off all they want to. The question is though, is this a ripoff?

OP has a few things going for him:

1. A cheap price.
2. No overseas shipping. Doesn't matter if Sri Lanka has a US hub, it still take time to go across the pond, deal with Customs problems, or any other number of problems.
3. No backlog that is mentioned) due to other project demands.

This means you can get minis painted cheap and fast. That is ALL he is advertising. For $3 a fig or $8 a squad those are more than good enough paintjobs.

Need to find out the definition of "squad" though. Technically 32 Termagants is one squad for me...

Wow yeah lay him some slack..he is jsut offering a service, dont reply if you dont want it..dont go and break him down by throwing insults like other people are better or whatever. there are a lot of lazy guys out there who would love this cheap service ..so lay off.

As someone with a painting service (http://www.bkarmypainting.com), I've hesitated to post in this thread for fear of appearing to have sour grapes. Best of luck to this guy, but I'll only say two things:

#1 - You get what you pay for. Not just in quality of painting, but also in terms of service. I charge competitive prices, but since I specialize in armies, I can do so because of economies of scale and technique. I also have to cover my own overhead, subsidize my shipping costs, pay taxes, etc. With a price point that low, I honestly don't see how the individual is making a profit. And if the painter's not mainting a profit, it can be a challenge to stay in business.

#2 - References are always nice. It's helped me that I'm somewhat well known here and in other places, and blogging the creation of my Chaos Daemons for GT Chicago last fall also helped establish my bona fides as someone able to paint minis to a good tabletop standard in a reasonable amount of time.

Centurian99 wrote:As someone with a painting service (www.bkarmypainting.com), I've hesitated to post in this thread for fear of appearing to have sour grapes. The only thing I'll say is that you get what you pay for.

OMG Sour Grapes RABBLE RABBLE RABBLE!

Clthomps wrote:(snippity snip)


I love this here:

Paintedfigs offer a much better paintjob for $3. It's not spectacular, but at least they thin their paints.

When is it ok to post an add for a competitor on someones forum?

I know it might not be a rule on Dakka, but on most forums, if someone is selling something and another person hi-jacks the thread to sell the same thing, it's considered bush league at best and piss poor at the very least. If one wants to post up about their own services, they should nut up and do it in another thread..

So, to answer your question Clthomps, I'd say it isn't ok and pretty low brow for someone to have don't that..

Golden Eyed Scout wrote:It's better looking then my POCs, that's for damn sure.
Keep at it, they look good for tabletop standard, and just keep on trying, you'll get where you wanna go with these eventually.

Thank you for your support I will be posting some of my best stuff soon

I said I would post some new Pictures and Here they are I hope all of you enjoy. Thank you to all who support me in what I am trying to Do.

The previous photos were the first time I had painted blood angels and they were for my son So they were not my best here are a few more photos of my work.

terryanddeidra, can you check your PMs!

Thanks

Your painting needs a friend. That friend could be Devlan Mud wash. Try it out to get some shading.

Your projects show promise. Keep it going.

there not actually that bad

Swordguy wrote:Just to be different - I support you on this one. There's a LARGE class of people out there that probably want to have painted armies, but don't have the time or ability to paint their own, and don't want to drop the high prices that "artist"-level painters charge.

First and above all else, welcome home Swordguy.

Now I have to reiterate the comments of most other people here that the paintjob is too thick, but I also agree with Swordguy: someone will buy them.

Here are my hints for you. Note that rather than give flat advice I have offered little directional steps that will of themselves steer you in the right direction.

1. Thin down your paint, a lot. It is all very well telling you this but without the hows and whys it is useless information.

To help you here on the next project use a white undercoat and wash it with heavily thinned down chaos black. You get black crevasses but a lighter surface easier to paint over. Later once your thick paint habit is broken move back to black undercoat if you like, or stay with white. You might also find this makes your jobs go quciker, due to having few layers giving you better return for your time investment.

2. Also remember that paint costs money, thick coats dont go very far. Especially as you leave a lot of paint on the palette, especially with mixing. Adding water cuts your costs and makes your job more viable.

To help you with this use the correct palette, you might already but if you dont get an artists palette with lots of little depressions into which you can dab paint before blending or thinning. Get ones with small depressions, not a watercolours palette or you will be steered into wastage.

3. Buy a scrapbook and keep a painting log.

This is so important especially as you get better and get more work. I am no way near a pro painter and paint very irregulary so my painting log is doubly important. When I paint a mini I write down what I did, what colours I used, what I blended with what, and how dilute I made the paint. This way if I pick up another squad for a completed army I can replicate the orginal work with a minimum of discrepancy; often many many years later.
For you this is doubly important as you can then budget your materials. Last thing you want is to get a commission for a large army, and buy too much of the wrong paint, its worse than too little of the right paint - unless you are in a real hurry. As you want to do a budget service cutting your costs must be a premium.

Now the painting log becomes of absolute importance if you get return customers. After all once someone buys from you and is happy with your work that person is more likely to rebuy from you. The re-purchase might not always be a new army, but could well be an extension to an existing one. Remembering what you did becomes extra important here, especially with regards to keeping basing uniform. Informing your customers that you keep a permenant painting log so that if they extend their army you can paint to match is a good selling point and can be seen as good customer service and will encourage return custom which is what you really want. Also print out relevant details of your painting log for customers so they can repair or add to their miniatures themselves.

4. Dont do eyes, yet.

Large monsters excepted. At your level of painting quality a flesh wash shadow is quite sufficient. If this looks odd add a little dark brown to the wash.

5. Improve your basing standards.

This is easy to do, anyone can base neratly if they know how, so for minis for sale there is little excuse for sloppy basing. For a start avoid grey bases, they look really dirty, doubly so on camera. Your Moria troll wasnt so bad, but the grey base made it look crap, likewise with your Fellowship models. While on those models; you need a strong inkwash over the grey rubble to give it definition.
Now what base colouirs to use: keep to goblin green, black or bestial brown. Only use goblin green if you give the base an even flock coating, also when on that subject if you give a base an even grass covering use flock not static grass. Static grass looks much better as clumps on a base than as a cover. Compare your winged Nazgul to the mounted Theoden figure, your Nazgul has a cool base, Theoden's base frankly sucks. Had you used flock he would have looked better, though don't mix flock and static grass bases in your work. Also do tidy up the rim of the base clearing away bits of flock or sand. GW has a painting guide book that tells you all the points just covered.

6. Conversions.

Now let us play to your strengths, your paintjobs leave a lot to be desired (by pro-paint standards) but the green stuff beard you posted was very good. You might actually want to start with unpainted conversions. Also if you are building an army for sale do do one or two conversions in it. Non-special character miniatures especially. Your customers will be happy to have a space marine commander that is unique, it becomes their army commander. But dont go overboard time is money and conversions take time.
Though then again as stated you might want to reimage yourself as a converter of models who sells unpainted converted squads and vehicles, in which case that would be all you do.

7. Think about your pricing structure.

As noted if you charge $8 a squad it means you charge the same for a squad of five marines or fifty conscripts. As this is business you need to quantify. I would recommend offering a different lower rate for single colours armoured models like Eldar guardians and space marines and a seperate higher rate for larger models and multi-coloured units like Bretonnian knights.

Edited for clarity

You're doing great! Keep up the good work. You might think about making a photo box. It's not hard to make and it does wonders for show men pics. Your level of detail is great, I was wondering what's your painting process?

Adding to orlanth , i use a large white ceramic tile to mix my paints on and keep them from drying as the surface stays cold.... better then a palate for me. but i am horrible at painting, also i made a few wet pallets....i forgot where i found the walk through, but is useful to keep those colors you mixed and liked from drying out. another tip is add a little organic thinner(the type that don't smell bad) if you are slow like me it will keep it from drying too quick on the mini while you are trying to spread it to the right places and do that shade effect. all that being said i like your details and color choices, you paint by far better than i do.

I find this thread hilarious.

Gwar! wrote:How is being Honest and not sugarcoating it being rude?

Because no one asked your socially awkward nerd ass what you thought. The guy just posted that he would like to paint for something for people and everyone flies off the handle thinking they know THE SECRETZ OF EVERYTHING LISTENZ TO MEZ!!!!11! I feel sorry for your teachers in school I bet you go to the nurse every day with a sore shoulder.

HEY GIYZ 1 TYME I PAINTED DIS 4 FIVE DOLLA!!!!


DIZ GUY IS SUCH A RIP!!!!!!!!

Get over yourselves.

You get what you pay for at the end of the day. Infact in most cases the painter comes out of a commission learning a hell of a lot but ends up getting below min wage...which doesn't pay the bills. $3! I'd have to charge that for cleaning the mould lines! I hope you get tons of work although i would back-up what folk say about getting a light tent...and thinning the paints
Happy painting! *dives for cover*

loved your models especially the ent and the balrog. But wasn't very fond of gandalf to be perfectly honest because the face needs depth.