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What ho chums.. I need some painting advice.

So, im still pretty much a novice, but im getting better, you can check my gallery...

Ive always base coated everything by spraying it black, but im about to start on some dwarf beserkers from AOW after a year cutting my teeth on space marines..

I figure ill paint over the black with brown predominantly, as the base for the skin and beard/mohawk makes up 90% of the model anyways.

So, can i just spray them all brown instead of black? Do you think that would cause any issues?

And do any of you lot regularly prime your models with other colours?

I also have a can of grey primer. Depending on the final colour on top, the primer can have an effect on how bright the model comes out. I find, especially with metallics, that white primer gives a bright clean finish, black is more muted. I tend to use grey on all my tyranids for a more neutral - flesh-like base to colours.

Oh right, so, you think priming brown will work? Or will cause issues with the whites/reds etc on the model?

Grey is a very common colour to use and is probably the best for the actual effect of colour. But of course it has the dis-advantage to black in that if you leave any paint showing through it will stick out like a sore thumb, unless you go right to the edges very carefully. Black has another advantage, if you leave a bit of black showing through in all the creases of the miniature, it defines the colour really well.

Brown is a bit more dodgy to use. Although if you washed it, probably with devlan mud or you could poke very small amounts of badab black into the recesses, before you painted it, that would define the colour rather well. One tip would be to paint the metallics black before basecoat though.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Ninjad twice, brown should not effect red too badly, but you might have to do a few layers of white or grey.

I have used brown base for my Nurgle but that is because it works with the color scheme that I am trying to go for. I haven't had problems but I guess it just depends on the colors you will use.

*Codex Grey is better than black imo since you don't have the darker color coming through.

Depends what for, as I have said you can use black to define colours. I do agree grey is the best for coverage.

I use black for my dirtier paint-schemes and white for my brighter paint shemes.

I've been priming with a mix of green and dark blue on my models lately... then I do a few layers of lighter greens for zenithal highlighting, and then I seal it with satin varnish, and use that as my basecoat / primer. Seems pretty durable so far, doesn't rub off when doing detail painting.

Of course, thats with an airbrush.. probably wouldn't work for brushing.

I use gray primer for a neutral effect on my paintjob. It doesn't affect the overall tone of the model like white or black does.

Cheers,


IK-Painter

Tried gray, did not like it. Now I either white-prime or dark-prime depending on the effect desired. For "good" figures, or brightly-colored ones, white is better. For "evil", dark color schemes or figures who are mostly armor, black works better as a base. That said, one adjusts as needed. For my Blood Angels I primed red to save some time with the base coat. Primed blue an unit of Bretonnian Grail Knights for the same reason. So for your Dwarven Beserkers, prime them in the majority color and save yourself some work.

Army painter does a range of coloured primers but also take a look in Halfords.
I mainly use their primers.
They do black, white, grey, yellow ochre & red oxide.

Here's a couple of pictures of some models I primed (but yet to finish painting!!!) with the last 2 colours:

I bascoated a bunch of catachans in GW's Desert yellow... It came out really nicely. I'll see if I can get some pics.

I've used army painter yellow, bone and green colored primers to good effect. Now-a-days they're kind of limited to my table-top quality armies as they are a bit thicker and have a candy-shell like appearance (like an M&M coating but no where near as thick. Even so, I have used them on really detailed paint jobs and don't think the figure has suffered as a result.

They can be a real time saver in a pinch.

I've primed with probably 12 different colors, it really depends on what overall shading theme I want for the model. A lot of skin and I would probably prime either brown or skin color to cut down on painting time.

You may want to try one mini first to make sure that you like the way it comes out then do your regiment. There's nothing like painting $50 worth of minis and then having to trash them because your primer was acting up or got old or it was humid that day, whatever.

I use army painter desert yellow which comes out brownish for my mantic undead. With a couple of washes it looks pretty good. My advice is try it out on a couple of test models and give washes a go too.

It does help to coat the yellow with a matt varnish (light coat) if you're going to use a wash on it... otherwise that candy-shell like surface tends to make the wash cover very unevenly.

I've tried a brown primer for yellow with OK results. I'm still experimenting on that one.

I'm currently painting my Blood Angles Assault Marines using the prescribed "dark flesh" i.e. dark red as a base and so far, I like it. I've got to get the figures finished though.


Otherwise, I've always used grey or black for years. I tired white and while it worked for bright colors (though it could make them too bright IMO), I didn't necessarily like it for darker/drab colors.

I only use Vallejo Model Air Gray Primer these days.

I've occasionally used grey, but have also used red, and plan to use yellow soon, as undercoats on car kits.

The red was for a F1 Ferrari, the yellow will be for a F1 Camel Lotus.

For me:

Grey works well for most colors, particularly well on metal models (since it's easier to see details than with black and white primers
Blues and Greens (and some metallics) are great when based in white, lighter reds as well (but you need a second coat of red to blot out the pinkish hue usually.
For everything else, Black

As a caveat though, for darker reds (particularly darker ones like for Khorne-themed stuff) that getting a brown or clear primer works best.

I use grey primer for almost everything, unless its a color I really want bright, then I use white.

OP, as far as priming in color, its fine, as long as you are using an actual colored primer, not paint. The real point of primer is to prepare the surface and give the paint something to stick to. If you simply spray your base color over bare plastic, metal, resin, etc you will likely get chipping and flaking.

I prime my skaven in brown, and it works really well, although my basecoats on top of the brown are all either foundation colors or black.

Mad4Minis wrote:
OP, as far as priming in color, its fine, as long as you are using an actual colored primer, not paint. The real point of primer is to prepare the surface and give the paint something to stick to. If you simply spray your base color over bare plastic, metal, resin, etc you will likely get chipping and flaking.

+1 on this. There is a difference between prime and your base color. I will repeat: The real point of primer is to prepare the surface and give the paint something to stick to.
Once your (spray) primer coat is on, then you work on the base color, ideally spray paint. That said, you want to use a primer color that works with your base color: white for bright colors, gray for medium colors, black for dark colors and other colors for special effects. In addition to white, gray and black, I have used red oxide, dark gray and yellow and green zinc oxide primer.

Tim

For my SW, i prime grey. between priming black, white, or grey on them, it makes absolutely no difference, but that's because I chose such a color for their armor (bit darker shade of grey-blue than most use).

For my nids, I prime white. Then again, they're fluorescent, so if you don't use white first, you wouldn't see any color

This very weekend, I intend to try my first non blackwhite primer: I got a can of Army Painter Dragon Red with my Necron order, and am going to try it on a batch of Blood Ravens & Khorne Berserkers. I'm almost as excited about that as I am about Necrons, stupidly enough.

Thanks for all the advice, I shall try it and let you know how it goes.

I also bought Bor Dragonbane from AOW.

Best model ever.