My attempt at the dipping technique

[Kris]

Hello All!

I've seen a few examples on the internet from people who have used the 'dipping' technique to get a bunch of their miniatures painted very quickly. However, being someone who likes to paint miniatures, I wasn't too fond of the idea - but in all honesty, I've got so many unpainted figures lying around, that well... I thought I could at least give it a try (and share my thoughts on my first 'dipped' miniature attempt).

For those of you unfamiliar with the technique... it basically involves priming your miniatures, and then giving them a quick base-coat of flat colours (no highlights or shading) - and then simply dunking them into a tin of varnish/stain. Sounds pretty crude right?

Anyway... I decided to give it a go, and so I assembled a GW plastic orc (I'm not all that fond of the GW orcs - so I was not too worried about ruining it ), gave it a coat of primer and glued it to it's base (well actually, I had originally glued it to a square base prior to priming - but then decided to replace it with a 2p coin instead ).

Then all I did was give it a quick base-coat of the basic colours I had chosen... not being too particular - just getting the paint onto the miniature at this stage. It took me about one hour (as I am a very slow painter - most people could probably have done it in half the time).

Anyway here's what it looked like at the pre-dip stage:


Next it was time for the dip.

The stuff I used was from my local Wilkinson's (Wilko's) Store, and is their own brand 'Interior & Exterior Woodstain'. I chose the 'satin walnut' colour (it cost £2.79 GBP for a 250ml tin I think).

So, once the miniature was dry I simply dipped the whole thing, head first, into the tin of woodstain for a few seconds... took it out... and shook off the excess for around a minute or so (in a nearby cardboard box).

At this stage there were a few areas where the stain had gathered heavily in some of the recesses (that I was having trouble shaking out) and after being placed back onto the table it slowly started to form a large drip at the bottom of his loincloth. To ease this problem I simply took a paper tissue, and gently poked the corner of it into these areas - and let it soak up some of the excess. All in all this whole process probably took less than 10 mins.

Then I left it to dry for a couple of hours (it say's 'quick drying' on the tin ) - after which all it needed was the base painting brown and a little static grass added. This is the final result:


Admittedly it's not great, but it looks like this technique may be worthwhile if you are in a hurry to get a few figures painted up in time for your next game session, or if you simply have a lot of grunts to paint and would rather not spend that much time painting them.

So there you have it... I thought I would post my experience (and results) just in case it was of interest to anyone out there who was considering the technique, or who had perhaps not heard of it before.

If anyone else has done this before, or has a few tips and tricks, it would be cool to hear about them

[pogre]

Looks good. You have the technique down - here's one link I have about it:
Dipping
Here is a cool article on dipping figures in poly stain for speed painting. I have used it on Eastern Indians to great effect!
DIPPING FIGURES IN MINWAX POLYSHADE

[Kris]

Thanks Pogre. I think it was in your painting guide post that I first heard about the technique

It does seem that a few people use the MinWax brand - but I have not seen it over here in the UK ...so I just grabbed the cheapest tin of woodstain at the local store and thought I would see how it turns out.

I'm not sure if I'm a fan of the technique or not yet (though it certainly is fast) ...but I will admit that the orc turned out better than I thought it would, and I think it looks much better than the pre-painted D&D mini's (which I am not criticising here... as I like buying the occasional box now and again).

I might try a couple more over the weekend... and I'll post more pic's if anyone is interested in seeing the results.

[pogre]

Originally Posted by Kris

I might try a couple more over the weekend... and I'll post more pic's if anyone is interested in seeing the results.

Please post your results. I was kind of wondering about dipping D&D plastic minis. If you hit them with a shot of matte I wonder if the dip would still adhere?

[Kris]

Please post your results.

OK... here's 3 plastic mini's that I have quickly painted up this afternoon... just the basic colours on these pictures:

Another orc (so I can compare it to the previous one):


An old chaos warrior (I really do not like this figure - but a good test for armour)


And some kind of beastman (again plastic and hopefully a good test for skin and fur/hair):



They have just gone into the dip, and this time I have not spent so much time trying to shake of all the excess, but have instead used an old paintbrush to try and remove it (or move it around). Once they have dried I will spend a few minutes on the bases and post pictures of how they have turned out.

I was kind of wondering about dipping D&D plastic minis

Hmm... I don't know about the woodstain actually sticking to the mini's... but if it does then it may work (aesthetically) on some of the earlier figures that didn't have a black ink/wash plastered all over them.

[el-remmen]

Hey, I think those look great!

And personally, since minis take a lot of wear and tear (and chipping) in actual use, a quick method is preferable - saving crazy detail and attempted perfection for those meant to be on display, not played with/

[Kris]

OK... here's the pictures of the same miniatures after they have been dipped in the woodstain (and their bases tidied up a little).

First here's the orc. For this test I just left the varnish on the swords however it dried to see how it turned out - as if it dried all patchy I figured it wouldn't matter too much as it could pass as a dirty/rusty orc blade. I was also curious to see how a paler skin colour (i.e. on the decapitated head) would turn out:


Next is the chaos warrior (which I may use as a heavily armoured orc). Even though I'm not fond of the figure, I think this one has gained the most from the dipping process:


Last is the beastman - who should pass nicely as some kind of half-fiend. With this one I tried to brush most of the stain off of the blades to make them look a little cleaner/brighter (and see what difference it made compared to the above orc):



So I think my verdict on the whole 'dipping' process is pretty much in agreeance with what el-remmen said. It's great for getting a bunch of figures done quickly... and because I've not spent all that long painting them, I'm also not gonna be too worried about them getting bashed around a little during use. Though in all honesty they do not look great under close inspection - but on the other hand, I can't remember the last time I painted several mini's in one afternoon (especially considering that half of that time was doing something else while waiting for the woodstain to dry).

But once you have several together... they don't look so bad:

[Kris]

OK so while I am it I figured I'd start tossing a few other things into the dip... just stuff I have attempted to modify in the past or stuff that has got broke (and thus I've spent a few minutes fixing).

So next up is something a little different... as I found this mini lying around from a couple of years back (that I had added a few horns to, in an attempt to make a brown dragon from the 'Monsters of Faerîn' book). So here it is before it has gone into the dip (took about an hour to apply the base-coats):



However I may just have had my first dipping catastrophe... it went into the dip about 20 minutes ago and has been sitting on the table slowly drying. However I accidentally knocked it over and it landed on the carpet - smearing a large section of the 'tacky' woodstain (which I then had to try and recover with a brush)

Unfortunately my initial reaction wasn't "$#!# ...the carpet!" it was "$#!# ...the dragon!"

Hmmm...

[Kris]

OK I faltered a little with this one...

So far I have resisted the urge to touch-up small areas of the miniature after the woodstain has dried - but seeing as how the stain doesn't really work to well on large flat areas I thought I'd just spend a quick 5 mins cleaning up this guys horns and claws a little (as they were a bit of a mess).

However I've only done it really fast with one colour and a large brush (as taking forever shading/highlighting them nicely kinda defies the object here), but I think it has helped.

[Victim]

If I had some minis that looked like yours did pre-dip, I'd just call them finished. Grr.

[pogre]

These are great speed paint jobs! I would warrant you that these are nicer than 90% of others' painted minis out there. The nice thing too is you have a built-in finish for figures you are going to be playing with.

[rowport]

Originally Posted by Kris

...spend a quick 5 mins cleaning up this guys horns and claws a little...

Kris-

Thanks for the thread. Your pics of the half-fiend results were enough to inspire me to give this technique a shot! I am curious about this last bit, though; I realize that you just did a bit of 'cleanup' painting on the last fig, but I wonder about the surface texture after applying the dip. Does the paint adhere properly to the waxed surface? Do you then have to re-seal the mini to cover the new paint? I wonder, because I am thinking about combining the dip layer with traditional drybrushing effects. Specifically, I think I could dip the mini mid-painted to get the skin layer slightly shiny, then paint the rest of the mini (armor, weapons, etc.) with regular drybrushing, and maybe then dullcoat the lot. (I spend the most time with wet-layers on skin, so dipping would save me the most time there.) What do you think?

[Kris]

Thanks again for the comments

Anyway, I figured that these guys needed some kind of spellcaster to back them up... so here's a small goblin mounted on a 1p coin (a figure that I had to repair and modify just a little bit):





And for anyone who's interested - this is the stuff I have been dipping my miniatures into:


I will admit that it's been enjoyable just painting up a bunch of mini's as quick as possible and not really fussing over all the details and layering etc., and I would say that I could have painted, dipped and based all of the above miniatures in one day if I had put my mind to it (instead of just doing one here and one there like I have been). That is in no way a boast on my part... just an idea of how many miniatures I reckon could be done in a day with this technique.

That in itself is a nice change (As I'm usually a painfully slow painter) ...and although I would have liked to spend more time making the bases look a little better (rather than just sprinkling a bit of static grass on them) - it would have kinda been counterproductive, as the aim was to try and get a tabletop-quality miniature done in as short a time as possible.

Anyway... here's a quick look at the whole bunch (sorry not a very good photo):


Maybe if I get some spare time in the next few days I'll attempt to dip a metal miniature that I actually like (rather than old plastic figures I'm not all that fond of)... and maybe even get a lighter woodstain to try out on paler colours & skin tones.

And if it's of interest I will continue to post pictures of my little dipping experiments

[Kris]

rowport...

I don't know if it makes a difference or not but the woodstain I am using is water-based (just thought I'd mention that) but the claws and horns covered OK (straight over the top). However the stain can gather quite heavily in some of the recessed areas... and drybrushing things like hair, fur or chainmail, may be problematic (as the raised areas might not be sitting much above the stain-filled recess - if that makes sense).

However, if you look at the orc with the two swords... the stain has just gathered in random areas on the flat surfaces of the weapons (it really doesn't handle these kinds of area's well) ...but they are smooth to the touch and I think I could probably tidy them by simply painting over them easily enough (though I have no idea if a drybrushing technique on them would pick up any inconsistencies that I can't see/feel).

It's probably also worth noting that I have also been slapping on a quick coat of brush-on matt varnish when they are dried... because after the dip they can be a little shiny.

I hope that helps

[Kris]

Tonight I thought I'd try a couple of metal miniatures - and see how they handled the dip.

So sticking with a similar colour scheme I've quickly painted a couple of LotR orcs (yep more orcs ). Also seeing as how the woodstain is basically shading the miniatures dark brown, I'm trying to stick with colours that work best with that (i.e. no bright blues etc.).

Anyway, these guys are a lot smaller than your average GW or Reaper miniature - and are more like true 28mm scale. The paint jobs are very basic (and remind me of the first ever miniatures I painted when I was like 12 years old or something ) - with the second one taking a mere 35 min's to complete (yep... I was sad enough to time myself for this little speed painting experiment ).





I much prefer the look of these orcs (even though these two particular mini's are not the best ones in the range) as they are far less comical looking than the regular GW orcs and goblins.

And here they are after the dip:


I am really happy with the difference the dip has made to these figures - whether it's just because they are smaller, or because they are metal and have deeper recesses than the plastic figures, I'm not sure... but they are without doubt my favourite of the ones I have dipped so far (of course it probably helps that I prefer the style of the sculpts themselves too )