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I’ve looked at lots of painting guides for salamanders:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=tAPIvkyt3eU
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wrngFkqIxlw
https://www.instagram.com/p/BipcEANFCaN/
http://tarvick.com/archives/2064

(And more besides)

Most of these are geared towards painting quickly, not producing smooth, clean results with good definition. I followed the most involved of the Warhammer TV guides. Now, what can I do to improve the results further?

To get better definition, should I use Gauss Blaster Green highlights?
To get better gradients, should I try wet blending on the smooth surfaces?
The WarhammerOfficial guide involves a Lamenters Yellow glaze. Should I glaze all the green before doing the edge highlights?
Is it time to start mixing glazes with layer paints and Lahmian Medium?

Could you post a picture of your current work?

Pictures of your current progress are a great idea, that gives people a chance to pitch appropriate tutorials to you.

Rik

 greatbigtree wrote:
Could you post a picture of your current work?

An excellent point. I posted that while I was away from home and had no access to the model I’ve been working on. Please bear in mind that I haven’t done the edge highlights or most of the non-green detail yet.

I'm a big fan of washes. In this case, since you've already drybrushed, I'd suggest a pinwash (using just the pointiest point of a fine brush) into the crevases of the armour. and round the ridges of the helmet. The darkest green you can find, or even Nuln Oil though I think a dark green would be better.

The darkness helps to make the light pop. Painting minis is all about creating exaggerated contrast / shadows to help define the shape of the mini. To pick a particular spot, the second picture, lower right leg. The small rectangle could be a little better defined, and a fine wash into the crease would help with that. Same thing in the first picture, model's upper left leg. Pinwashing into the creases will help to add depth to the model.

You have nice, smooth black on the shoulders, and some very nice colour transitioning on the "tail" armour.

 greatbigtree wrote:
I'm a big fan of washes. In this case, since you've already drybrushed, I'd suggest a pinwash (using just the pointiest point of a fine brush) into the crevases of the armour. and round the ridges of the helmet. The darkest green you can find, or even Nuln Oil though I think a dark green would be better.

The darkness helps to make the light pop. Painting minis is all about creating exaggerated contrast / shadows to help define the shape of the mini. To pick a particular spot, the second picture, lower right leg. The small rectangle could be a little better defined, and a fine wash into the crease would help with that. Same thing in the first picture, model's upper left leg. Pinwashing into the creases will help to add depth to the model.

You have nice, smooth black on the shoulders, and some very nice colour transitioning on the "tail" armour.

Kinda has you all covered here.

Although, if you want to push yourself you could attempt to soften up some of your drybrush "transitions" with some really careful glazing* once you've done this some neat edge highlights and some careful pin washes and that armour will look great.

*By glazing, before I get jumped on a little, I don't mean GW Glazes straight from the pot.
-Get your base colour and thin it RIGHT down with a bit of medium and a lot of water.
-Start with a patch test based on a ratio of 1:1:5 Paint:Medium:Water
-Each time you do this you should see a VERY subtle shift of colour, it basically just tints rather than paints.
-Move your brush from the lighter area to the darker as this will "pull" the glaze away from the lighter patch so you don't flood it.
-Each layer of glaze should cover a slightly smaller area.

This should give you a smoother and more even transition from light to dark green.

Rik

 Rik Lightstar wrote:

 greatbigtree wrote:
I'm a big fan of washes. In this case, since you've already drybrushed, I'd suggest a pinwash (using just the pointiest point of a fine brush) into the crevases of the armour. and round the ridges of the helmet. The darkest green you can find, or even Nuln Oil though I think a dark green would be better.

The darkness helps to make the light pop. Painting minis is all about creating exaggerated contrast / shadows to help define the shape of the mini. To pick a particular spot, the second picture, lower right leg. The small rectangle could be a little better defined, and a fine wash into the crease would help with that. Same thing in the first picture, model's upper left leg. Pinwashing into the creases will help to add depth to the model.

You have nice, smooth black on the shoulders, and some very nice colour transitioning on the "tail" armour.

Kinda has you all covered here.

Although, if you want to push yourself you could attempt to soften up some of your drybrush "transitions" with some really careful glazing* once you've done this some neat edge highlights and some careful pin washes and that armour will look great.

*By glazing, before I get jumped on a little, I don't mean GW Glazes straight from the pot.
-Get your base colour and thin it RIGHT down with a bit of medium and a lot of water.
-Start with a patch test based on a ratio of 1:1:5 Paint:Medium:Water
-Each time you do this you should see a VERY subtle shift of colour, it basically just tints rather than paints.
-Move your brush from the lighter area to the darker as this will "pull" the glaze away from the lighter patch so you don't flood it.
-Each layer of glaze should cover a slightly smaller area.

This should give you a smoother and more even transition from light to dark green.

Rik

Thanks folks.

On the subject of pin washes, I had already done one recess shade of Biel-tan Green. If the darks aren’t dark enough, it could use at least one more coat.

For glazes, I had been thinking of doing glazes with caliban green, but I forgot to pick up Lahmian medium the last time I was in the shop. I’m going to have to order some.

So, Caliban green glaze will make the armour darker. I guess more drybrushing to lighten the armour? Or should I glaze with moot green once I have some Lahmian medium?

Edit: And greatbigtree, thanks, I appreciate the compliment! On the shoulder pads, you know what Duncan says: Two thin coats are better than one thick coat! I was also quite happy with the colour transition on the tail armour. But it appears to be a trick of the topography of that section of the model. It just took the wetbrushing and drybrushing really well... Which is why I'm here. I want the rest of the model to be that good.

I don’t think I got the glaze quite right. It looks to me like it wasn’t thin enough. It was 1:1:2 Caliban Green:Lahmian Medium: water. Should I be brushing it on or painting a small line of it and pulling it up with the brush?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Rereading your post, Rik, I didn’t have nearly enough water in my glaze. The tale of painters blog suggests 1:3 Caliban Green:Lahmian Medium, so that might be an avenue to try as well.

I watched a few more tutorials and tried some more glazing. Here’s the result. I think it’s quite a bit better than my previous attempt.

Annirak wrote:
I don’t think I got the glaze quite right. It looks to me like it wasn’t thin enough. It was 1:1:2 Caliban Green:Lahmian Medium: water. Should I be brushing it on or painting a small line of it and pulling it up with the brush?

Rereading your post, Rik, I didn’t have nearly enough water in my glaze. The tale of painters blog suggests 1:3 Caliban Green:Lahmian Medium, so that might be an avenue to try as well.

You're always going to be balancing speed vs quality with painting.

For gaming pieces speed will win, because you want models on the table. For display pieces it's all about quality and there's no "deadline" as such. For competition pieces, it all depends on your planning really.

The answer to how thin should a glaze be? Is really, how much time do you have? The thinner the glaze, the more coats you'll need for the effect to be noticeable but you have WAY more control with thinner coats.

I wouldn't use just medium to thin my glazes either, as this won't change the consistency much just the amount of pigment. Water is thinner than the glazes, if you start with glaze:medium:water at 1:1:4 and experiment from there, every pot of paint is slightly different too, so it won't ALWAYS be the same unfortunately.

As fair as directionality of brush strokes goes, you want your brush to be moving towards where you want the colour to be strongest. So for shading, you're moving the brush towards the areas where they'd be darkest and for highlights you're doing the reverse and moving towards what should be the lightest point.

Rik