Painting Blonde hair

Flexor the Mighty!

18/100 Strength!
How do you guys go about this? I painted a mini and the blone beard and hair tuned out horrible. I get red hair easy enough and other colors, but blonde always looks weak. What do you base coat it with to get the dark shade you can highlight?
 

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The following are Reaper Master Paints, but you can look at their color chart to find equivalents in your brand - I took this formula from their boards BTW:

Blonde (Ixminis)
Griffon Tan - all hair
Flesh Shade Ink - all hair
Griffon Tan - highlight all
Desert Gold - highlight almost all
Buckskin - Placing main light source highlights
Ivory - bringing it smaller fast
Linen White - really tiny
White - small as it gets
 

I can't be terribly specific on color names, since I'm at work, but I tend to do hair in mid-to light colors, ink wash, then highlight. So for blond I'd paint it all a golden tan, wash with a brown ink, and then highlight with at least two lighter colors. Since blonde tends to be slightly transparent/metallic, I wouldn't go all the way to white unless it is a *very* pale blonde.

Unlike most people, I prefer to basecoat humaniod models in white, unless the figure is going to have uniformly dark features.

However, Pogre is an amazing master painter, so maybe you should take his advice instead! :D
 

Keska said:
I can't be terribly specific on color names, since I'm at work, but I tend to do hair in mid-to light colors, ink wash, then highlight. So for blond I'd paint it all a golden tan, wash with a brown ink, and then highlight with at least two lighter colors. Since blonde tends to be slightly transparent/metallic, I wouldn't go all the way to white unless it is a *very* pale blonde.

Unlike most people, I prefer to basecoat humaniod models in white, unless the figure is going to have uniformly dark features.

However, Pogre is an amazing master painter, so maybe you should take his advice instead! :D
Thanks for the compliment!

I think if you examine them, our methods are actually very similar. Base mid, wash, base, mid-highlight, light highlight, and then very top highlight.
 

Thanks for the tips, to be honest that is more level of detail than I put on regular minis for the gameboard, but I'll keep that in case I do any show type pieces.
 

Are we talking blonde blonde, or dirty blonde? For the latter, I have had luck with dark brown, wash with gold, then dry brush light yellow, if you're not looking to spend a lot of time.
 

Flexor the Mighty! said:
Thanks for the tips, to be honest that is more level of detail than I put on regular minis for the gameboard, but I'll keep that in case I do any show type pieces.
If you just want them to get to the pretty good/good enough for gaming level (as a wargamer, I know that desire!), go with a mid-brown base coat and then drybrush it with some yellow that maybe has a teeny spot o'brown in it to take the edge off the yellow and bring it a little closer to the base color. You can leave it at that point, or do a final light drybrush of a lighter yellow. It's not gonna win any painting awards, but it's fast, and good enough that people know it's a blonde character.
 

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