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I'm new to painting minis. I find myself with lots of time these days, so why not.

I've followed tons of videos online on how to paint minis, and I decided to go with Blood Angels because... reasons.

Now, to my understanding, a basecoat should be smooth and opaque. You shouldn't see any tint, in this case lighter red and deeper red.

But this is exactly not what I'm getting.

Do you normally do more than one coast for basecoating? Am I thinning it too much, or too little? Is it a brush problem?

Don't hesitate to give pointers. This is a first coat of Mephiston Red over an army painter white primer.




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Ergh, second try for the picture.

One characteristic of all paints is transparency, and it varies from paint to paint and color to color. Reds are almost universally pretty transparent, so multiple (thin) coats is required to get a good solid base. Mephiston Red is one of the most opaque reds you'll find and it's still transparent enough to require a minimum of 2 coats.

The only good alternatives to multiple coats are spray paints - either rattle cans or airbrushed. GW makes a Mephiston Red basecoat/primer in rattle cans if you want to save time.

Welcome to Dakka and the hobby side of 40K, I hope you enjoy painting and modeling as much as I do! Also, feel zero shame in choosing a bunch of blood drinking raving lunatics who's lust for blood forces them to charge heedlessly into the guns of their enemies! I run White Scars so feel the pounding heart and exhilaration of the hunt as well!!
There are far better painters about, but here's my input. That happens. There are many solutions, I suspect most will suggest multiple thinner coats. That will work and can get great results. However, the simplest is to switch from a white undercoat (red over white is a tough cover) to a red undercoat/primer. Also, if you are going to do washes and highlights, they will also downplay the uneven nature of the base coat.
I would try on one miniature (say the one you showed) give it a wash from one of the dark red washes (this might be carroburg crimson? but others sell good washes, there has to be a blood angels tutorial about showing color choices), then go back over it with your base color, leaving the recesses alone. Then highlight edges?

Give this thread a day and you should get a ton of advice on this. There really are some great people who happen to be excellent painters about.

Edit: Oops, ninja'd! See above for good advice.

Thank you both! I'm unsure about blood drinking raving lunatics. But I am the owner of a small winery, so I'll replace that with wine-drinking raving lunatics, and all will be well.

Cheers and thanks!

I'd bin off the white primer. It will make basecoating much harder as you'll need more pigment to cover it, so will need to be competent in using thin layers. I'd go with a grey primer. You need to thin your layers and apply multiple, allowing them to dry. Another technique you could do would be to apply a heavy drybrush of your red over a dark/black layer. Then you can use your thin layers to finish off areas of colour, while leaving some basic shadows in recessed areas. This is an easy way of achieving a basic high contrast look, which will make them standout.

If I decide to prime again, should I strip everything off, or can I prime over? I don't want to loose details.

I would probably strip and do a fresh thin coat of primer if you want to save small details. There are some great threads on some nice cheap stripping options to help if needed.

Yeah I'd second stripping that off as its a bit thick. Keep your prime layer quite thin too. The model doesn't need to be thick with it. A light spray will do you fine.

Doesn't look that terrible. I'd wash it and then give it another go working thin layers of red where you want smooth red. Then highlight and do next model.

Since you're using Citadel paints anyway might as well buy a red spray. Another good primer for red is light brown.

Don't buy citadel sprays, unless you really like spending money.

Just a thought for you in addition: if you start over and you’re going to paint lots of red models, a medium brown primer works very well. Better than black or white if you’re just painting red. I know army painter makes some.

For starting out and if you are doing blood angles using citadel paints I would use the mephiston red spray. Citadel spray cans are consistent and the colours match perfect. Army painter sprays cover well but Sejm less consistent to me and much more dependent on the conditions at the time of spraying. Similar price too. I have found some lovely car primers that are a good price. White is very unforgiving to base over. I are doing everything right though, I’ve seen lots of so called experienced painters on here not priming and not thinning their paints properly.

You will also here a lot of critics of GW paints, ignore them. Use the best brand for what ever colour you are painting. And when it comes to reds GW can’t be beat. Other firms do other colours better but the reds from GW are lovely.

I wouldn’t start over. I would slap on a few more thin coats and be done. But don’t worry about being so neat. Decent sized brush and slap it on nice and thin. Do a few models at once. It’ll even out.

Paints are just paints. Their quality only depends on hue and covering power matching your expectations. There is no "best brand" there. From non-citadel reds, for example, VMC Flat Red is deep, strong and has great coverage. VMC Dark Vermillion is good if you want something brighter.

 queen_annes_revenge wrote:
Don't buy citadel sprays, unless you really like spending money.

Except if you specifically want one of the base colours that they cover. It may cost a bit more, but there is a lot of value in not needing to spend time and paint in putting a couple of base coat layers over the primer.

A base colour maybe, but not their 'primers'

Update: I've decided to strip the paint from two models - because the comments about trying to put another layer came at a later time . One is being stripped with Simple Green, the other with Isopropyl Alcohol 99%.

As the temperature outside doesn't allow me to spray paint anymore, I will be trying to airbrush the primer with Badger's Stynylrez primers. Black. And then probably basecoat it, again, with the airbrush, with Mephiston.

Thank you all for the advices

If you have an airbrush just prime with that lol.

I do have an airbrush. I just never airbrushed before, but seeing with the temperature being sub 20C right now, I figure it's a good time to start. And starting with priming and basecoating will be good practice, I think.

Lol yeah disregard pretty much everything suggested and just airbrush your primer and red base. You’ll be amazed at how nice and smooth it comes out.

Update: I received from Amazon my primers from Badger, as the price seemed reasonable for a new guy.

Here's the result.





Tried reaching Badger customer support. No dice.

Good times.

You can prime and basecoat with airbrush if you like but if you're like most people you'll soon find it more of a nuisance when you could just rattle can primer and fat brush a basecoat.

I can't see the first two photos, so will carry on regardless

I am useless at using my airbrush.
Rattle-cans get used for undercoats, and the airbrush for large-area basecoats. A couple of dribbles of car screenwash, and a few drops of GW basecoat paint into a mixer-pot.

 queen_annes_revenge wrote:
You can prime and basecoat with airbrush if you like but if you're like most people you'll soon find it more of a nuisance when you could just rattle can primer and fat brush a basecoat.

What does this even mean?

Sure, I can understand rattle-can primers if you actually intend to use a proper primer, but there is no way that using a hairy brush for a base-coat is less of a nuisance than airbrushing it.

I find it easier to brush basecoats. I dont think its worth the set up and de-prep of an airbrush just to basecoat.

Generally, don't get paints and primers shipped when it's freezing out. Especially Badger's Stynylrez, it seems to freeze quite easily and once it has gotten frozen, it's ruined. Looks like what you got partially froze.

I learned that now. No primers in the cold

For basecoating with a brush, or an airbrush, I paint mainly while watching... or I should say listening to some Netflix series. So, a brush is better. For priming, I'm going with the airbrush. Perhaps I'll go with the airbrush as well for basecoating, I don't know. But I don't care about the time it takes (for now )

I’m gonna have to disagree that brushes are faster than the prep, painting, and clean up of using an airbrush.

I can base and layer in a quarter of the time it used to take me to just base paint. Airbrush also has a much smoother finish and can get hard to reach spots.

Are you after a quick table top standard or are you painting for display ?

Anyway, i would spray red(whatever red you can get) --> Wash --> higlight/drybrush for a decent result and go from there.

 Argive wrote:
Are you after a quick table top standard or are you painting for display ?

Anyway, i would spray red(whatever red you can get) --> Wash --> higlight/drybrush for a decent result and go from there.

Painting display. Mainly practicing. Once I'm fine, I'll move to others. By the time I get good at it, my daughters should be of age to actually play the game.

Busterbunny wrote:

 Argive wrote:
Are you after a quick table top standard or are you painting for display ?

Anyway, i would spray red(whatever red you can get) --> Wash --> higlight/drybrush for a decent result and go from there.

Painting display. Mainly practicing. Once I'm fine, I'll move to others. By the time I get good at it, my daughters should be of age to actually play the game.

And painting for themselves