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Sup' Dakkas

Finally after some time painting, I feel just about ready to try out blending technique. At first I haven't got a clue how to do it, or I mixed one article for another, but after reading few articles I'm ready to give it a shot.

There are some questions bothering me ofc.

Where is best to use blending? Surely on clothes, but can it be used on space marines armor, or Orks even due to their raised muscles?
What would be the best model to try and practice blending? Or can you use blending for just about everything? Would it mix well to drybrushing armor?

If I got the main idea right, its the primer->base coat and wash and then blending begins with lighter, much thinned down paint and dragged towards edges with multiple layers in order to achieve blending highlights -correct? +wiping off some paint into cloth to avoid pooling

Correct me if its something like this
Black Primer - Dark Angel's green base, Thrakka wash -> snot green blending?

Would that work for my scheme metalics? Black primer -> Dwarf Bronze drybrushed armor -> 2 coats of pure baal red in order to achieve fiery orange -> and than blending...? Question is with which paint do I do it? And is it multiple steps?

Cause I have choice to pick from shining and burnished gold, and mithril silver but I could use silver for sharp edges points of highlights.

Also for blending, how do you go around it about recesses? For example space marine has lots of cracks in armor, and I've read after you're finished blending it can be sometimes rough and wash is suggested here?

So my question if some of the paint goes into the cracks, can I fix it with wash after blending process?

Cheers
(sorry if I typed something wrong, I was kinda in a rush)

I somehow get the impression from your questions that you tried to understand how to use the blending technique but newer asked yourself what it's goal is. Or why you'd need to use it.

The purpose of blending is to create a smooth transition from one color into the next. This can for example be a gradient from blue to purple or just from dark green to light green.

You thin down the paint gradiently to allow the underlying paint to show through. Or in case of wet blending try to mix two colors while both colors are still wet to create a transition between those two. And this is not limited just for highligting but applies to all color transitions for a smoother and more natural looking paintstyle.
This is an example of blending. (not my work)


And blending by itself has nothing to do with washes. So washing before or after is not part of the actual blending process. I for myself as a painter with only limited experience would say, wash after blending.

Now with all of that in mind you can probably answer all your color related questions yourself. For example your metalics one: You blend your metal with that color you want your metal to transition into. There is no general formula you have to use for a specific color.

And if you don't want to paint your miniatures all in golden demon quality I'd suggest to use bleding only on larger surfaces. And bacause you thin down your paint the smaller the areas is you are painting the bigger the problem gets of paint flowing like a wash into recesses. WIth that in mind good examples for experimenting with blending are larger surfaces like undecorated armor or cloaks
I for example experimented with blending on space marine shoulder guards to add the impression of a diffuse lighting to them. (With limited results.)

I tried my arm at blending last year, not long after i started painting again after a long break. For my ultramarines I undercoated black, then a base coat, then a wash, then I started my blending. I tried to avoid the recesses in the armour but mistakes can be retrieved just by carefully dropping a little ink in the recess. I used only three colours, VGC imperial blue, VGC ultramarine blue and VGC wolf grey. But on the bigger areas like the shoulder pads and lower legs I used around 6 or 7 different mixes of those three colours to move from 6-1 imperial to ultramarine, through pure ultramarine, up to pure wolf grey. All mixed with vallejo medium glaze as well. It was a very time consuming process but I enjoyed it and was happy with the results. I used the tutorials on massive voodoo, it's a site I would recommend.


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