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Hi all,

I've collected around 2.5k of custodes now, painted following GWs guide.

I think I can improve my end results and have been looking into more advanced techniques.

I plan on using my airbrush and the gold scale 75 set, and use it on the new dropship that has been released.

Unfortunately I am having no luck finding tutorials on how to airbrush gold metalics and I'm a little reluctant to forge ahead without some advice ( I will attempt this on a spare model first anyway).

Does anybody have any advice or can point me in the right direction?

Thanks

Best advice is have a fallback plan!

Airbrushing metallics can be hit and miss, especially with acrylics. What works well with a brush can fail hard with an airbrush.

I had great success with Vallejo's Liquid Gold range, thinned with Tamiya X-21A thinner. Went on smooth and shiny over a brown basecoat. Complete bugger to clean the airbrush out though - very fine pigment, and a lot of it. I'd go so far as to say a dedicated cheap airbrush for metallics isn't a bad call.

Alclad's lacquers are also a good fallback and heavily used in scale modelling circles (but they need cellulose thinners for cleanup, so a proper mask is a really Good Idea (tm)).

S75 metallics are excellent for the AB, you don't need to do anything different than you would with other paints.

Luminous Lizard wrote:
Hi all,

I've collected around 2.5k of custodes now, painted following GWs guide.

I think I can improve my end results and have been looking into more advanced techniques.

I plan on using my airbrush and the gold scale 75 set, and use it on the new dropship that has been released.

Unfortunately I am having no luck finding tutorials on how to airbrush gold metalics and I'm a little reluctant to forge ahead without some advice ( I will attempt this on a spare model first anyway).

Does anybody have any advice or can point me in the right direction?

Thanks

Best thing to do is grab a spare model like those cheapo free marines that gw gives out and test it out

General thing i know is that most people do gold over a base of black, brown or purple.

gunhazard did a huge thing for painting gold http://atticwars40k.blogspot.com/2011/10/great-gold-rush-quest-for-best-gold.html but i think it was by hairy stick.

Did some sigmarines with an airbrush for the golds, black primer, two coats of "Glorious gold" VMA, then a zenith of "Polished gold" to get the basic colours.

Fleshtone wash over then dry brushed the GW Golds, pretty easy, have some custodians here but still on the frames, planning something similar.

A mix 50-50 of glorious gold and burnt umber as a base if you want it darker works pretty well

 Desubot wrote:

Luminous Lizard wrote:
Hi all,

I've collected around 2.5k of custodes now, painted following GWs guide.

I think I can improve my end results and have been looking into more advanced techniques.

I plan on using my airbrush and the gold scale 75 set, and use it on the new dropship that has been released.

Unfortunately I am having no luck finding tutorials on how to airbrush gold metalics and I'm a little reluctant to forge ahead without some advice ( I will attempt this on a spare model first anyway).

Does anybody have any advice or can point me in the right direction?

Thanks

Best thing to do is grab a spare model like those cheapo free marines that gw gives out and test it out

General thing i know is that most people do gold over a base of black, brown or purple.

gunhazard did a huge thing for painting gold http://atticwars40k.blogspot.com/2011/10/great-gold-rush-quest-for-best-gold.html but i think it was by hairy stick.

Thanks for the shout dude! I actually did a lot of those with the airbrush.

Keep in mind, scale 75 metallics are really, like REALLY matte.

For metallics you want to be sure you have a large enough nozzle/needle size, I've never had a problem using 0.4mm.

Also, I'm quite fond of already including shaded recesses when doing metallics. I do that by applying a darker version of the metallics from below and the proper version from above. Adjust to taste and enjoy the look or a shaded mini straight off the airbrush booth.

Thanks for the replies! That tutorial is very helpful. I've got a .3mm nozzle, would this be okay?

Yes definitely ok.

WInterdyne's advice is spot on, thin them out. I used Vallajo Gun metal for a titan and it came out great, you may need to jiggle the trigger as you are painting to help force any dry bits out. After you are done, i would let the parts of the airbrush soake for a while to clean them.

After you hit it with the metalic, i would also run and wash like nulin oil for iron/steel over the airbrushed metal and dry brush necron compound, gives it an amazing industrial look.

Also, most importantly, and i cant stress this enough....WEAR A BLOODY MASK YOU GIT! seriously, out of all the paints to be airbrushing, metallics are probably the one you need the mask for the most, its literally metal flakes being atomized, you dont want that in your lungs.

To go 1 step further I'd say... thin everything, even proper Airbrush paints. Most of the time my AB mix is mostly thinner with some paint... and use a proper thinner, I recommend Liquitex Airbrush Medium (or golden or vallejo)...

But I airbrush metallics regularly. Years ago I bought a cheap Masters Airbrush for fear that the metallics would mess up my expensive airbrushes, but now I don't care, vallejo model, vallejo air, scale75 and Andrea metallics all airbrush so easily, and clean up easily with alcohol/water mixes.

It really depends what metallics you're using. They all behave a bit different. Some like wet coats, some like dusty coats, some don't mind higher pressures, some (most) prefer lower pressures, you usually can't go wrong thinning a bit but some can absolutely be over thinned.

In general I suggest preshading metallics because it can be hard to coax them in to crevices without over wetting the raised areas, so best to preshade and then you don't have to stress about hitting the crevices perfectly.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Backspacehacker wrote:
Also, most importantly, and i cant stress this enough....WEAR A BLOODY MASK YOU GIT! seriously, out of all the paints to be airbrushing, metallics are probably the one you need the mask for the most, its literally metal flakes being atomized, you dont want that in your lungs.

I think you'll find most metallic paints are actually mica rather than actual metal. Actual metal flakes oxidize very quickly (turning dull) and aren't appropriate for paints, so mica is used instead. I haven't checked the msds of all metallic paints in existence though so don't take it as gospel that they're all mica.... and really mica isn't something you want to be inhaling either, lol.