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After the roaring success of my last post, I thought I'd try a second time with something basic and n00b enough to get me kicked on a Call of Duty server...
So I'm very new to mini painting and I'm trying to enjoy it more than become mega-skilled (For now anyway until my plans to take over the world via hobbycrafting take the next step). I'm current;y working on the Shadow Dragons from Descent and, so far, have the base coat sorted. Now this is the first time I've come across such a large space to paint and thought I would take a crack at blending. Needless to say it went awfully and I had to throw down another couple of layers to cover, slightly marring the finish.
So now I have this really big wing, and I want to do something (other than just wash it) with a richer, sharper colour (I'm doing a Celestra Grey Dragon, so maybe a nice white, blue and yellow).....what clever design ideas do you have that don't involve blending that would bring something cool to this large space - and for future reference, wings in general.
Photo ideas would be awesome! And remember I'm pretty new at this.....
Cheers Internetterz!!
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2017/08/02 19:20:12
Did you try googling Shadow Dragon from Descent? There are plenty of inspiring pictures for you to choose from. You can paint your minis how you'd like, you bought them. Try different things until you find something you like. Almost any color matches grey so go wild. There are loads of different tutorials on youtube.
Like Kujo Painting (I think he's a fellow Dakkanaught)
Did you try googling Shadow Dragon from Descent? There are plenty of inspiring pictures for you to choose from. You can paint your minis how you'd like, you bought them. Try different things until you find something you like. Almost any color matches grey so go wild. There are loads of different tutorials on youtube.
Hey dude…..thanks for replying!
Yeah I pored through them and read what I could when they mentioned how they painted them….many used blending, a few used washes, quite a few of the really good ones used airbrushes (Which I don’t have). Some people just left them a single washed colour….
I suppose I worded the question rather loosely – I guess it’s more: What techniques/tricks are there to add colour patterns that transition and look as pretty as Blending, that a novice could try (when their blends look like 12 year old tipex spilled on a sock)……
For instance, in the interim I was thinking about painting a simple fracture pattern from the wing tip to the centre, where a solid block of colour breaks into smaller blocks as it transitions. I’d probably have to draw it out first, but in theory it’d look a bit like a colour transition, without any of the blending skill….
You could use dry brushing. Layer darker to lighter. Make sure your bush is dry, wipe it on your hand or paper towel to make sure its putting out enough paint.
Or paint the colors wet so red then overlap the edge with orange so the colors mix and keep going until its white. The more changes in color the hard its going to be. In the picture it looks like they used 6ish colors.
Find a how to paint lava on youtube that matches what you want and mimic it on the wings but instead of a painting the raised areas lighter paint the towards the tip of the wing as the raised part.. if that made any sense.
That is pretty advanced for painting, it will take practice, so if you fail try again or strip and paint it again.
I've fallen off doing so for workspace reasons, but a cut rate wet palette can help--either buy from a craft/art store, or cover a wet sponge or the blister pack foam with a folder paper towel or uneaxed parchment baking paper, then put your colors to be blended on there, then like maddok was saying with keeping a wet edge. You can also kinda drag part of the paint blobs og color towards each other on the palette, get an instant gradient to pick out colors from.
Or just get lots of very closely spaced premix colors between the two you want, and just paint blocks of color. It helps to thin them with water or medium until just before they lose cohesion, as that lowers the density of pigment you're laying down, and lets the under color peek through the upper. This is generally called glazing, but really, its acts like washing or layering, depending on thickness of the paint.
Of course, this really just all boils down to "simple ways to start learning to blend"
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2017/08/05 06:43:44
Thanks for the tips guys - yeah I know I need to work out how to blend properly at some point, but my first couple of attempts were so awful, I didn't want to try them out on a proper mini because I nearly ruined it once. I'm more confident with drybrushing, so I'll look into using that for a transition.....
So a wet palette you suggest would be a good blending practise tool? also is there an ideal brush size for blending - I tried using the large and medium brush (As you can tell I'm clutching at straws instead of the git-gud branch of probable success)
Not sure of GW's sizes, but I expect medium will work fine for most areas you'd want to actaully try to blend on. You want big enough for a good bit of paint, with a good fine tip, but not so large as to make it too hard to get in corners and the like. I just got a Windsor and Newton series 7, size 1 from amazon, and its working pretty good for me so far.
Edit: I'd also suggest getting cheap minis to practice on-makes you feel less bad if you gotta strip or toss, because it was all of $3-5 dollars. Reaper Bones are great, but hard to get in the Uk. The new deep cuts Nolzurs d&d stuff or board game figures might not be a bad substitute, but not sure how available it'd be over there.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2017/08/07 13:38:19
Yeah thats why I like drybrushing it's my favorite way of painting, Its quick and it dries really fast. I like the wya the model looks, needs a black wash on the body to not have such a harsh transition from white to grey. You could also dry brush those spikes dark grey then do a light dry brush of white, just keep at trying new things and you'll be a pro.
I found a beautiful wing tutorial years ago that I've kept bookmarked. It is for airbrush, but you could probably reproduce the overall effect with hairy brushes. Just maybe without such nice colour transitions.
