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I know dipping figs in wood stain for shading was a popular method a while back, and one I used myself. When I painted up a new batch of `Nids here recently however I noticed they were not the same color as the ones I did almost a year ago. I did some checking and made sure it was the same color of Minwax that I used the first time, and it was. I also looked at the pictures I took of my `Nids a year ago when I first painted, and noticed they were a lot lighter in color back then. Apparently the Minwax darkened over time. I'm wondering if anyone else has heard of or experienced this, and what might have caused it or if there's a way to prevent it.

First picture is my stuff I painted a year ago, taken a year ago. Second picture is stuff I painted two days ago next to the year old stuff as it looks now.

Aduro wrote:I know dipping figs in wood stain for shading was a popular method a while back, and one I used myself. When I painted up a new batch of `Nids here recently however I noticed they were not the same color as the ones I did almost a year ago. I did some checking and made sure it was the same color of Minwax that I used the first time, and it was. I also looked at the pictures I took of my `Nids a year ago when I first painted, and noticed they were a lot lighter in color back then. Apparently the Minwax darkened over time. I'm wondering if anyone else has heard of or experienced this, and what might have caused it or if there's a way to prevent it.

First picture is my stuff I painted a year ago, taken a year ago. Second picture is stuff I painted two days ago next to the year old stuff as it looks now.

it might not be a case of darkening but the opposite. i can't speak for models but when you use wood stain on wood and it stays in the light, it lightens and eventually the color fades over time. how do you store your models? are they in areas of direct light or stored in cases?

Each can will have a slightly different level of pigment in it...just like paints. My brother in law is a professional hardwood installer and this was what I got from him. If he needed more than one bucket of stain for a job, he would mix the batches together to make sure the stain matched for the whole job.Also, if you use part of a can, then store it, the stuff you left in your garage for a year might not look the same as the first stuff you dipped in it. This is because the pigments separate in the can.

Stored in cardboard boxes under a desk, so not a sunlight issue. And it's not just a difference in color of the pigment because you can look at the figs in the picture from a year ago and they're not the same color as the same figs picture I took this week.

The first picture looks significantly lighter to me - the models themselves, I can't tell too well. They look about the same imo.

I have a bunch of dipper necrons, and they haven't gotten any darker (or lighter) that I can tell of over the last year.

I dipped my TK army over the course of two and a half years, using the same batch of minwax wood stain. The figures are all evenly shaded.
I poured 2 quarts of the stain into a plastic lidded container that i stol-- ,er borrowed from the kitchen.
I noticed that when the stain had sat for awhile a thick layer of pigment built up on the bottom of the container. This took a few minutes of stirring to get it evenly mixed up and ready for dipping. Try that and see if it helps you.

Oh, and dont shake stain, stir it to avoid air bubbles.

I can't really see much difference to be honest but then again, I suppose it is different if you are comparing them in the flesh, as it were.

Aduro wrote:Stored in cardboard boxes under a desk, so not a sunlight issue. And it's not just a difference in color of the pigment because you can look at the figs in the picture from a year ago and they're not the same color as the same figs picture I took this week.

it might help us see if you took a picture of a few from each unit next to the other in the same pic with alot of lighting/flash used.

right, I think it's more likely that the cans of varnish were slightly different or you used a slightly different method for applying it than it changes color drastically over just two years.

I mean, the same is true for paint. Has my color degraded, thus showing the base coat, or was I actually just a worse painter back then and wasn't able to cover over a base coat as well?