el-remmen
Moderator Emeritus
I missed this thread somehow!
Here are my words of encouragement. . .
I tried to start painting minis as a teen and may have completed one or two, but they looked awful and I knew it and I did not have access to the internet or a peer or mentor that could show me the ropes. I gave up.
About a decade later, I was back in college after a break and found a new group to play with and run for and they used minis a lot. I started collecting them too and once again tried to paint them, found I had even less patience, and gave up again. (though gained my love for building terrain through playing Necromunda). I I just let my friends paint my minis when they wanted to use one as a PC or if I had a big monster I wanted for a set-piece and would ask on the sly of someone who could keep a secret and not use out of game knowledge.
But then, the pandemic hit 20 years later, and I needed something to do. I did not keep track of the first 2 years of really painting minis, but I was just closing the books on my mini painting records for 2025.
I paint A LOT of minis now, despite my two false starts decades apart. And while my output has lessened post birth of my daughter, if you told me even 5 years ago that I'd paint over 100 minis a year, I would have scoffed.
So yeah, if I could do it, a person who has no particular artist ability, but can pump out table ready minis that other people coo over (even though I know they could be A LOT better), then I have no doubt you can too!
All the advice from MGibster and Sacrosant (and probably others that I just skimmed) is spot on. I esp. swear by cheap brushes. I just throw them out when I am done beating them to hell. I have tried "better" brushes, but maybe I am just not a good enough painter to benefit from them. It just felt like throwing away money.
Here are my words of encouragement. . .
I tried to start painting minis as a teen and may have completed one or two, but they looked awful and I knew it and I did not have access to the internet or a peer or mentor that could show me the ropes. I gave up.
About a decade later, I was back in college after a break and found a new group to play with and run for and they used minis a lot. I started collecting them too and once again tried to paint them, found I had even less patience, and gave up again. (though gained my love for building terrain through playing Necromunda). I I just let my friends paint my minis when they wanted to use one as a PC or if I had a big monster I wanted for a set-piece and would ask on the sly of someone who could keep a secret and not use out of game knowledge.
But then, the pandemic hit 20 years later, and I needed something to do. I did not keep track of the first 2 years of really painting minis, but I was just closing the books on my mini painting records for 2025.
I paint A LOT of minis now, despite my two false starts decades apart. And while my output has lessened post birth of my daughter, if you told me even 5 years ago that I'd paint over 100 minis a year, I would have scoffed.
So yeah, if I could do it, a person who has no particular artist ability, but can pump out table ready minis that other people coo over (even though I know they could be A LOT better), then I have no doubt you can too!
All the advice from MGibster and Sacrosant (and probably others that I just skimmed) is spot on. I esp. swear by cheap brushes. I just throw them out when I am done beating them to hell. I have tried "better" brushes, but maybe I am just not a good enough painter to benefit from them. It just felt like throwing away money.
