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I've recently discovered zenithal highlighting or rather, basecoating, and it seems pretty cool. Now what I am wondering is - should I do it with mainly black models i.e. Iron Hands, Raven Guard and so on, too?

Because, if I've already primed them black, doing a white zenithal highlight from above and then having to paint all the black armor black again seems a bit pointless really.

What do you think?

It would work if you prime black, zenithal in white, then base coat in either a thinned down dark grey like Eshin Grey, or a mixture of a very dark blue and black.

By doing a couple of thin coats the zenithal stuff will be visible underneath, I guess.

You don't really want to base coat in black anyway, really. It's super hard to make it look good as you can't go any darker.

Do the white zenithal highlight on the black basecoated marines, but then use a black wash over the affected areas to show where light hits.

If you're using an airbrush, it's easy, just run up through greys.

Black needs VERY subtle, long blends on the diffuse reflection (up to quite a dark grey), and then very sharp extremes.

I have used this technique using just white over black and then inks to add color. Works very well.

winterdyne wrote:
If you're using an airbrush, it's easy, just run up through greys.

Black needs VERY subtle, long blends on the diffuse reflection (up to quite a dark grey), and then very sharp extremes.

This. Black models are super easy with the airbrush. Some quick zenithal gray from above and then a few crisp edge highlights and you're done.

 Gunzhard wrote:

winterdyne wrote:
If you're using an airbrush, it's easy, just run up through greys.

Black needs VERY subtle, long blends on the diffuse reflection (up to quite a dark grey), and then very sharp extremes.

This. Black models are super easy with the airbrush. Some quick zenithal gray from above and then a few crisp edge highlights and you're done.

I'd actually have said blacks are quite hard to do because it's too easy to make it look like a faded grey rather than a black. Takes a bit of skill and know how to airbrush highlight black without it just looking faded.

Most other colours you can do the airbrush highlights with lighter but still vibrant versions of the colour, so it might look a bit cartoony but doesn't look like it's been faded by the sun.

With winterdyne's emphasis on "VERY subtle"... going easy on the highlight is necessary or, as you say, it can just look like faded grey... but really it's pretty easy, a quick fade-in blast on the helmet and shoulder pads and backpack, a tiny bit of the arms and knees and feet and you're done.

I've never tried with white, I always use grey, but I can imagine using white might get you to that cartoony look pretty fast.

Yeah I understand what you mean. But learning how subtle to be is literally the hardest thing I find with painting It's usually not until a few steps after I've done what I've done and it can't be fixed without repainting the whole model that I think "hmmm, that really should have been airbrushed slightly lighter" or "that highlight should have been more biased toward that edge" or "way too much contrast" or "way not enough contrast".

I find black is the hardest because all your feth ups stand out more. There's a fine line between accentuating the natural highlights of a black, ie. something that looks black with highlights, and something that simply looks like it's been left out in the sun too long and faded. Most people end up with the latter. It's more about how the highlights are distributed I think than the actual tone of the grey you use.

Thanks for all the replies! I don't have an airbrush, so I'll probably do a test model with the black ink idea! Thanks!