TrooperGrunt wrote:I am new to
40k and have really enjoyed it! I have been painting a Raven Guard army and have a lot of Vanguard and Sternguard Veterans. Some of you may know that
RG vets have white pauldrons and arms to distinguish them from regular marines. While trying to paint this I found that my white paint jobs were not coming out as well as blacks. I have tried two kinds of paint: a cheap Walmart acrylic thinned down with water as well as Vallejo Paints "Dead White" thinned down with water. I have tried to thin the paint varying degrees. When I thin it to where it coats and spreads on the mini well it dries with visible and unevenly. When I thin it less it spreads decently but globs up on the brush and ruins the details of the minis because of how thick it is. But when I thin it MORE it dries beautifully but runs down the mini before it dries because it is so thin and also shows the black undercoat, even after multiple layers. I am so frustrated because I am such a stickler for the details, which sucks because I am new so I keep messing up.
So I turn to you denizens of DakkaDakka. Please guide me with your glorious knowledge! KEEP MY DREAM OF BEAKIES ALIVE!!!!
Getting a smooth, opaque coat of paint is difficult enough, all the harder when you've got a transparent paint like white to deal with. The real trick is getting surface tension to work for you rather than against you. Start by putting down a grey color over the black. Then, take the white, not too thinned down, and paint the edges of the area. Let that dry, then go back with properly thinned paint (consistency of milk) and work from the edge inwards. Because you've bordered in the same paint, it's less likely to spill out, but you have to be careful not to touch any inside angles like any raised detail, or any outside angles like a vent or corner, or the paint will run away from you. Expand the leading edge of your wet paint until you've covered the entire panel that you want to paint. If you have the tension just right, your paint forms a thin layer that will dry opaque and without brush marks or clumping.
Important, constantly adjust your paint consistency. Stir it before taking up more paint, and add water if you think it's getting too thick. I used this method to paint my Tau years ago, and it's time consuming as heck (several hours per trooper), but the result is good.
That's old Codex Grey over black paint in one single coat. Note that all the inside edges (channels in the guns, gaps in armor plates) are avoided, and eventually these edges were given highlights. That's hard to do with white, so you might consider an off white or very light grey to highlight up to white.
