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Hi, im new to the site and haven't played 40k since I was about 15, im 24 now and am finally ready to field a fully painted army...the last model I painted was The Deceiver when I was young, and this is my first real attempt at painting. I'm looking for constructive criticism painters can offer on ways to improve my technique. Also, can anyone recommend a good detail brush? I have shaky hands and the GW fine detail brush is just too large for some of the things I want to do. I will be expanding the thread with more pics of my crons' later ( at work at the moment ). All pictures are work in progress.

Looks really good, very clean. An excellent start. Some advice/critisizm.
There are a lot of things that go into having a shaky hand, and a lot of solutions.

First, magnification. I was amazed in college when I started using dissection microscopes (two lenses so you have depth perception) how steady my hand was at the microscopic scale when usually I had a shaky hand when working with small objects. Get some hobby magnifiers and a lot of your shaky hand will go away. You can get headband ones that work pretty well for less than 30$.

Secondly, never hold the mini in your hand when painting details. You are doubling your shake when you do that. Ideally you would use one of those mini-holders, but I typically just put it on the table and hold it in place with one hand. Not perfect, but it helps a lot.

Next your gold: it looks like you are painting gold over a black base. Don't do that. Base the area in brown first, then paint gold over that. Gold needs to be highlighted just like everything else. Try burnished, shining, then shining/mithril for edging.

It looks like you may not be using washes, but just painting up by hand. While you can get excellent effects like this if you are good, for those of us who aren't golden demon painters washes produce better results. For the steel try base (boltgun I'm guessing), badab wash, highlight with base, highlight with silver (mithril). For gold try brown, shining, wash, burnished highlight, burnished mithril edge.

I had a hard time with the glowing green of the Necrons, trying several combinations of dark angels green, goblin green, scorpion green, and white, but never getting a result I was happy with, until finally I hit some advice that really made my greens pop: green should be highlighted with yellow. Yellows are usually very thin, so it still looks green, but a very vibrant green.

So try goblin green, scorpion green, scorpion/yellow highlight on your green 'gems' (if you really want it to pop add goblin/dark angel to the front of that list).

Looking forward to seeing more.


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One last thing. I'm guessing you saw the GW paint job of the overlord with the gold rims and liked it, just like me. It's tough to pull off. If you inspect their picture closely you may notice they made it look 3d by having a thin black line separate the blue and gold portions and simulated edge highlighting on the 'edges' of the blue and gold areas.

Now just painting a thin black line that perfectly would be tough, certainly beyond my capabilities. I've found some success is first doing the edge in black, then re-doing it, slightly thinner, in gold, leaving a thin line of the black exposed. I've been pretty happy with the effect. It isn't perfect yet (my hand isn't steady enough ), but at least it now looks like the armor itself has a ridge instead of just being painted gold.

Thank you for the reply, I frequently wondered why my gold looked...dirty.. I guess that explains it. I've never had anyone really teach me the basics, or watch tutorials or anything, I generally just go by the pictures on the box and wing it...I appreciate the suggestions and will try to invest in a magnifying system..here are some more pics of my works in progress..as always, critique these and tell me what I can do better. Also...in the close up pics I notice the boltgun seems to appear kind of grainy..how would I make this go on smoother and look more clean?












In this pic the overlord has received a devlan mud ink wash and i've started work on the staff



















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Wow, after going over these and seeing them so large im noticing a lot of mistakes and areas I need to go back and retouch...especially on the plastic overlord and anni barge

From what I can see it looks like you are trying to paint in too few layers, that's why you have grainy metallics.

The most common, most important piece of advice for painters of all skill levels is 'thin your paints'. Even with foundation paints it should take at least 2 layers to get good coverage (with some exceptions, like grey). Some paints are very weak and will require a lot more. Red and yellow, for example, are very weak and can require 6+ layers to get a good color when painted over black.

There are tricks to help with that though. You base gold in brown, so even if you don't get complete coverage it just looks a little darker instead of 'dirty'. For super bright red highlights you can base in pink (white being a fairly strong pigment) then paint red over it. The final combination of pink and red will be a very bright red.

There are ways to use the semi-translucent nature of many paints to your advantage though. Remember I suggested highlighting scorpion green with a thin yellow? That is because the yellow is so translucent the green will show through, and it will just appear as a bright green. For skin you should always have one layer of red or purple in there, because it will subtly show through the flesh layers to give the appearance of real skin.

That is why priming black always makes the whole model feel darker, and priming white always makes the whole model feel brighter. The base coat shows through (unless you REALLY go out of your way to get good coverage).

So, to sum that up: thin your paints, and remember paint layers are semi-translucent. Work around that or use it to enhance the model, depending on the situation.

Thank you, I will take all the help I can get to improve my skills. Now, im still looking for a good detail brush, as it seems like the GW ones bristles get all spread out and start getting paint everywhere, the brush in this video seems to effortlessly fit in all in the little nooks and crannies in this model, anyone know what it is?

Wow, that's impressive how he uses that brush. I've never seen a detail brush retain and flow paint like that well. Thanks for sharing that.

Between that and the blending he's doing, I wonder if he isn't using a flow aid and/or drying retardant. Usually brushes that size have problems with paint drying on them, and blending with acrylics is always problematic. Hopefully someone will respond with some insight.

You mentioned you were self taught. Are you using a brush soap? That is one of the essential things in painting that self taught people usually don't know about. You absolutely NEED to use a brush soap & preserver. Even cheap brushes will last 5-10 years with a cleaner, and even the best brushes will fray within a few months without it. If you haven't already grab some Masters Brush Soap & Preserver. It's (6$) and will last you 1-2 years per container.

Also, do not wash your brushes with hot water. It melts the glue that holds the tip.

riplikash wrote:
You mentioned you were self taught. Are you using a brush soap? That is one of the essential things in painting that self taught people usually don't know about. You absolutely NEED to use a brush soap & preserver. Even cheap brushes will last 5-10 years with a cleaner, and even the best brushes will fray within a few months without it. If you haven't already grab some Masters Brush Soap & Preserver. It's (6$) and will last you 1-2 years per container.

I have just started the war gaming hobby and know nothing about paint techs etc. and til your post I didn't know about brush soap and preserver. Thank you, you have saved my brushes.

Op - Failien Abduction your models look quite good but as you said you can notice the mistakes on the small detail work but I am sure you can fix most of that. Keep up the good work and its nice to see more Necrons as they are my army too.

Thank you all for the kind words, I'll take every piece of advice seriously...I still wanna know what brush that is!

As for magnification, i bought a set of 3x reading glasses at Walmart for a few dollars. Cheap and does the trick.