Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

A week or so ago I created a post, showcasing my first foray into the world of Warhammer 40k, and miniature painting, and you guys gave me a ton of good advice. Today I received a couple new brushes, paints and a wash to play around with, taking all the advice into account I attempted to improve upon my first efforts and finish up a 5-man squad in my test scheme. The end result is something I'm quite happy with, although I really need to work on keeping everything a little cleaner, to the naked eye the models look fairly solid but they are not particularly photogenic, the camera tends to pick out some rather messy work that I've not really noticed, I'll work on it I promise!

The metallic silver metal color I've been using makes the whole model look fairly 'dirty' regardless of how even I coat it, may try another base color in the coming week and see how it works out. The wash on the other hand is great, at the very least it really brings out all of the shading on the helmets, they just looked plain wrong without it so thanks for all who suggested I give it a go. One other thing, some areas of the models appear to have an odd texture to them, this is from the Dettol Cleaning process where I've failed to clean 100% of the old paint, OR fat fingered part of the model during priming, need to stop rushing this stuff. Besides that sorry for any shoddy-looking work, It was an accident I swear! So, for your consideration, my un-named half tactical squad.

Gallery: http://imgur.com/a/2cRIN

Edit: I'd like to add highlighting, but I've got no idea what color would be best, and where on the model, any advice would be great, thanks.

Wash's, they work great on metallics, I use army painter dark tone which when used in few layers is ideal for dirt/burn on exhause barrels and one careful coat can make metal more real and remove some of the too clean shine

Im at work at the moment so stuck on my phone which won't letme take a good look at them.

Personally though, I think the overall scheme is bad ass but will wait till I get home to comment further. Any chance you could take a pic of a couple of individual guys really close up ( like you did before)


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Im at work at the moment so stuck on my phone which won't letme take a good look at them.

Personally though, I think the overall scheme is bad ass but will wait till I get home to comment further. Any chance you could take a pic of a couple of individual guys really close up ( like you did before)

jhe90 wrote:
Wash's, they work great on metallics, I use army painter dark tone which when used in few layers is ideal for dirt/burn on exhause barrels and one careful coat can make metal more real and remove some of the too clean shine

I've used a nuln Oil wash for this batch, Really happy with how it makes the helmets look.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Johnson & The Juice Crew wrote:
Im at work at the moment so stuck on my phone which won't letme take a good look at them.

Personally though, I think the overall scheme is bad ass but will wait till I get home to comment further. Any chance you could take a pic of a couple of individual guys really close up ( like you did before)


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Im at work at the moment so stuck on my phone which won't letme take a good look at them.

Personally though, I think the overall scheme is bad ass but will wait till I get home to comment further. Any chance you could take a pic of a couple of individual guys really close up ( like you did before)

My camera was being a real bitch, it just refused to focus but I hope these are good enough! if not I'll try and take more if you wish. Thanks for your kind words

http://imgur.com/a/nfBSn

That wash has made a big difference compared to your last batch. The silver still looks a little too clean for my liking (but thats just me).

Do you think your paints? It looks spot on in some areas and thick in others (again this could be my eyes deceiving me)

The second to last pic (of your first set of pics) is my favourite. The wash really brings out the details
.

Im not really experienced enough to offer any further advice though :( Maybe on the reds, start with a darker red (or just mix black and red together) then when you apply the brighter red leave recesses and other parts dark. E.G leave a boarder of dark red around the eagle on the bolter. From here on in though Its a case of "lots of subtle details will add up to a big difference)

Again, I really like this scheme

Johnson & The Juice Crew wrote:
That wash has made a big difference compared to your last batch. The silver still looks a little too clean for my liking (but thats just me).

Do you think your paints? It looks spot on in some areas and thick in others (again this could be my eyes deceiving me)

The second to last pic (of your first set of pics) is my favourite. The wash really brings out the details
.

Im not really experienced enough to offer any further advice though :( Maybe on the reds, start with a darker red (or just mix black and red together) then when you apply the brighter red leave recesses and other parts dark. E.G leave a boarder of dark red around the eagle on the bolter. From here on in though Its a case of "lots of subtle details will add up to a big difference)

Again, I really like this scheme

I don't thin my paints, although in my first batch attempt I was not using a wet Palette, today when applying the wash and re-doing the silver I did and that may have caused some inconsistency with the look. The next group I do will be exclusivly using that wet palette method, although I've read a lot about specifically thinning the paints I assumed the palette would kind of do that job for me? Can you offer up any more advice about thinning paints?

As for the red, I will give that a go, I suppose I should start trying to go the extra mile for small improvements, again thank you for the comment.

Edit: I do dip the brush in water fairly often, so I don't get that thick, almost rigid paint straight from the bottle.

Well I do what everyone tells you not to do and thin my paints in the pot but I have my own system and I've ruined enough models to know how thin I like my paints I have my base paints (currently red) slightly thicker than the rest.

I dont know about wet pallets :(

I can't give too much advice being a beginner also, but two things stick out to me:

As Johnson says, the coat is pretty uneven. Thinning the paints like you're intending to do with the wet palatte will help with that

Mold lines! I definitely noticed a lot of mold lines. For example...



See that thin line running down the outer side of his thigh? That's a mold line, & it's made incidentally by making the plastic model. They aren't meant to be there, & it helps a lot with texture if you remove them anyhow... Assuming you don't know, & its not just one you've missed , you can watch videos about it on yt like this one about how to remove it.

Either way I think it's a really good first job & they impressed me when I opened the link, I hope I can paint mine up as good first shot

 Laura Marx wrote:
I can't give too much advice being a beginner also, but two things stick out to me:

As Johnson says, the coat is pretty uneven. Thinning the paints like you're intending to do with the wet palatte will help with that

Mold lines! I definitely noticed a lot of mold lines. For example...



See that thin line running down the outer side of his thigh? That's a mold line, & it's made incidentally by making the plastic model. They aren't meant to be there, & it helps a lot with texture if you remove them anyhow... Assuming you don't know, & its not just one you've missed , you can watch videos about it on yt like this one about how to remove it.

Either way I think it's a really good first job & they impressed me when I opened the link, I hope I can paint mine up as good first shot

Thanks, I guess this is another thing I missed having bought them all pre-built, they'll have to wait till I strip them down again for that treatment but I'm in no hurry. I'm going to do some more today so I'll work on the uneven paint coats and post my efforts here later in the day. Thanks very much for the link, very helpful.

They look pretty good, are you going to add highlights to the red? And how are you going to base them all?

 elStrages wrote:
They look pretty good, are you going to add highlights to the red? And how are you going to base them all?

I want to add highlights but I'm not sure in what color and where, any advice? As for basing I'm going to hold off until I'm happy with the quality of the paint job; at that point I'll strip them all down and begin from scratch, including the bases.

I suck balls at highlighting metallics so Im of no use to you there.

With the reds i dont think you can really highlight the curved areas but for the gun you could just mix a small amount of white into your red paint so that its just a bit brighter and highlight using that. You might be able to do a blend type effect on the kneepad with the same colour. Have the upper part of the pad brighter than the lower to give the effect of light hitting it. Think its called the zenithal technique (or something like that) Its what i do with my reds. Will put a pic up in a seperate thread later once hes finished so you can see what I mean.

You look like you have a full army in the background.

I think they look fine. I have to agree about thinning your paints is about the best advice anyone can give to a beginner. You really can't add highlights to metallic paint. However with the red I would do a edge highlight. Just lighten the red you have with a little white and run along the edges where light would be. even a light dry brush on the weapons could help some. For contrast I would use a blue/ green base colors. Grass Tuffs etc.

 Sammoth wrote:
I You really can't add highlights to metallic paint. .

WEll thats hours of trying wasted XD

Johnson & The Juice Crew wrote:

 Sammoth wrote:
I You really can't add highlights to metallic paint. .

WEll thats hours of trying wasted XD

Well if you washed (nulin oil shade) and it's a bit darker. You could use Liquitex Matte Medium to make your paints a bit more opaque to make the metal pop some more after shading (adding a layer of paint). This way it doesn't cover the shade to the point where the mini has no shadows. IMHO

Johnson & The Juice Crew wrote:
I suck balls at highlighting metallics so Im of no use to you there.

With the reds i dont think you can really highlight the curved areas but for the gun you could just mix a small amount of white into your red paint so that its just a bit brighter and highlight using that. You might be able to do a blend type effect on the kneepad with the same colour. Have the upper part of the pad brighter than the lower to give the effect of light hitting it. Think its called the zenithal technique (or something like that) Its what i do with my reds. Will put a pic up in a seperate thread later once hes finished so you can see what I mean.

You look like you have a full army in the background.

Army:
6 Tactical Squads = 60
2 terminator Squads = 10
2 Scout Squads = 10
2 Command Squads = 10
2 Assault Squads = 10
3 Captains = 3
1 Master of the Arsenal = 1
1 Devestator Squad = 5

That's the lot I bought for £90, came with a codex, rulebook and carrycase + foam. What you saw in the background was a portion of those I've already stripped down. Thanks for the info, I'll look into it


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Sammoth wrote:
I think they look fine. I have to agree about thinning your paints is about the best advice anyone can give to a beginner. You really can't add highlights to metallic paint. However with the red I would do a edge highlight. Just lighten the red you have with a little white and run along the edges where light would be. even a light dry brush on the weapons could help some. For contrast I would use a blue/ green base colors. Grass Tuffs etc.

Thanks, I've started messing around with a blood angel scheme to get to grips with highlighting, and the really precise brush control that comes with it. I'll look more into thinning paints but my attempts have just left me with paint that does not really lay properly, or even. Thanks for your advice though. Don't start with the bases! I've got enough to figure out haha. Thanks again man.