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Due to my being away a lot i cannot always get to paint Miniatures or War game. I can however contribute as I can often get internet access, I have begun a personal task or a "Crusade" which people are free to join.

My intention is to re-invigorate the Painting and Modelling sections of the Articles section. I have acquired alot of advice and skills over the years but it's only in the last couple of years I have developed the patience and financial stability to do what I want to without worrying about costs (a nice incentive to all you Students and young ones at school, work hard get a good profession or Career and you pursue your own goals and pursuits!).

I aim to achieve it by studying (yes studying) I have a science degree but have no idea about Art. With this in mind i have been trawling around old book shops looking for books on any Art subject, from a complete guide to Airbrushing to Colour Theory. I have amassed a fair bit of cheap old school material and actually i have begun experimenting and photographing and cataloguing the results. Some have been successful others have failed miserably. I am now writing articles but it may take a while to get a number of good quality articles going.

So my fellow Dakkanauts, I am formally asking for your support (even if you are only going into my articles to improve my punctuation or grammer! Joke) if you want to join the Crusade, find a local cheap charity shop or old book store as you never know when you will find a "Gem" with lots of unused or relatively unknown techniques.

I might be a Newbie here, however, I might suggest redesigning or rebuilding the article section of the site. It's kind of a messy database, and many of the categories have too many sub categories with only 1 article in them, or just super long category trees leading down to a handful of articles.

Just my two cents.

Well its kinda wierd. We have the article site, which is messy. We also have the Painting and Modeling Tutorial site, which is GREAT, but occasionally hard to find stuff you want. I think there could be some recombination of the two (or at least the good tutorials).

Agree with above posters; the 'nesting' of the subcategories and categories is an absolute nightmare to navigate. There is at least 2 layers (sometimes even 3) of nesting too much in the current layout. Once this has been sorted i would be happy to join in. Am starting to write up a tutorial as we speak. (sculpting muscaluture).

My 1st Article for the Crusade.

Colour Theory, light and Shadow. Enjoy.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/wiki/en/Colour_Theory,_light_and_Shade

I'd suggest getting rid of really old Taktica.
For instance, the Ork Taktica is more or less obsolete.

Article number 2 WIP..

Article number 3 Done....Priming vs Undercoating.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/wiki/en/Priming_vs_Undercoating

looks good, I like the look at different colors of primer and what they are used for?

what about paint on priming? also what about priming to the color that your minis will be (eg priming blue for ultramarines)? How will this affect the overall paint job? I liked how scientific your last article was, what is the science behind weather for priming? One of the biggest mistakes that new painters make is caking on the spray paint way too thick. It would be neat if you put a little section in there as well.

The addition of these elements would make the overall tutorial seem much less rushed.

Okay all good questions Grey Knight Luke. I am on it, plus I am trying to get 3 of the same miniature and I will prime one white, one grey and one Black. Then I will paint all 3 the same base colour (probably Ultramarine Blue because everyone loves Ultramarines! joke).

I will then photograph them together under a Daylight bulb to directly compare the difference to the final finish that the different colour primer gives/ if any...

On the subject of Colour Primers if we all work together we can all add to these articles so i am more than happy for you to help out (remember to put your name at the top so you get a Credit for the Article with me remember its a group effort!).

Ok I have been meaning to figure out what is the best spray primer to use (krylon, army painter, GW, ect.), so I'll be tackling that and we can mesh that into the article. I guess I can also do some research and write up a tutorial on brush priming (for people who don't have the means to spray paint, eg. "I live in Alaska and my wife wont let me spray in the garage"). But this is a really good start to the tutorial system!

Yeah cool idea I am working on Dew point Temperatures and as a Professional Mariner it's kind of my thing...

Oh and Article 2 is about the science of Paints, e.g Pigments, Resin, Vehicles, Additives, general advice etc. I think my Articles are going to take the form of starting with the "SCIENCE" and then finishing with "GENERAL TIPS & RULES OF THUMB" this way Dakkanaut's can skip to the Advice, but if they truly want to understand why these techniques work they can read the top of the Article.

I think that's a great format. Perhaps an article regarding structure/style to standardize everything? CCP has a bunch of Wiki Jockeys that edit for style, perhaps something similar could be useful here?

At the very least, articles in the old system should be moved and styled into the wiki. I think that's the most efficient way to organize this kind of thing (easy and low overhead, too).

Okay no problem. I was thinking that we should do an easy Reference e.g. a Quick reference Chart such as short notes on how to paint Fabric's, metal's different kinds of Armour. Primer etc. I will try and prepare it as a Table and import it into the Image Gallery.

Hmmmm, hate to say it but why are you purity seals you've made as big if not bigger than the scouts head?

Really enjoyed your colour theory, light and shade article! Thanks for posting these!

How about an article for each for each material, and have them lumped into the same category? What'd be really cool is articles for every models that link to tutorials on the materials involved in painting. i.e. Painting Green Flesh, Leather and Swords would be listed on an Orc article.