What I've Learned From Painting My First Mini in 7+ Years

[Olaf the Stout]

A week or so ago I decided to crack open the paints again and give miniature painting another go. Initially I was going to repaint some of my prepainted D&D minis that I had collected. However in my painting box I found a number of unpainted minis that I got but never actually painted. So I decided I would give one of them a go just to get myself "back in the saddle".

The mini I picked looks like an elven ranger. He has a large billowing cloak and is holding a sword. There is some fine details such as straps on his armour, but nothing too difficult so I thought it would be a nice mini to start back into things with. Here is what I have learned so far.

1. I'm very slow at painting!

So far I have spent probably 10 hours painting the 1 mini and there are still a number of things I have to paint/redo before I am finished. I'm guessing that I will have spent about 15 hours painting this 1 mini by the time I am done. I know that some of the professionally painted minis can take 50+ hours to paint. However once my mini is finished it will probably look like something someone could have done in 5 hours!

2. Always make sure you completely scrape off all the mould lines off of your mini before you start painting.

I thought that I had already scraped off the mould lines years ago as the mini was sitting in my painting box already primed and ready to pain. I was so keen to just start painting that I didn't really think about the mould lines. As it turns out there is quite an obvious line on the shoulder of the cloak. As I have been drybrushing the cloak the paint has been catching on this mould line, making it stand out.

3. Faces are hard to paint.

I've spent ages trying to paint the face on this guy. I've finally gotten to a stage where a good amount of shading can be seen in the mouth, nose, etc., but it took quite a few goes at it. Getting the skin to look a natural skin colour has been a challenge. Another difficulty I had was highlighting. I don't know if it's because I'm highlighting the wrong areas or I'm overhighlighting the face. In any case, whatever I was doing just didn't look right. I think it looks ok for now but I'm sure I can do better. I've still got to pain the eyes and eyebrows though so there's still time for me to stuff it up!

4. Shading is hard to keep!

The cloak on my mini is quite large and it has a number of folds in it, allowing for a fair bit of shadowing and highlighting. Initially I painted the cloak a dark green colour (Dark Angels Green in the GW range). However, after I started to drybrush the raised areas it didn't look dark enough overall. So I went back and repainted it again, this time with some black mixed in as well. I then painted some of the folds an even darker mix of green/black. Despite doing that I am finding that by the time I have drybrushed the mini to highlight the raised areas the shadows seem to lighten a lot. I have to keep going back and darkening the recesses. Am I overhighlighting or is there something else I'm doing wrong?

Olaf the Stout

 

[WhatGravitas]

The mini I picked looks like an elven ranger. He has a large billowing cloak and is holding a sword. There is some fine details such as straps on his armour, but nothing too difficult so I thought it would be a nice mini to start back into things with. Here is what I have learned so far.

I demand pictures!

3. Faces are hard to paint.

Have you checked pogre's painting tips thread? There are some tricks to "help" you - I learned a lot from them... when I picked up painting last summer!

4. Shading is hard to keep!

Nah, drybrushing is evil! To more precise: I've found drybrushing is much more useful for bringing out fine textures (fur, hair, scales) - cloth and many other things are far too large for drybrushing.
Look at my mini thread - the very first miniatures are highlighted by drybrushing (best seen on the Lich) - and it took a lot of time and I had the same problems as you.
Then I moved on to blending - the first try was the mind flayer - I wasn't bold enough, not enough contrast. Later on, I became bolder, as seen on the ranger and the dark cleric with the glowing skull.

And I have to say, I find blending a far superior and more controlled technique than washing and drybrushing.

Cheers, LT.

 

[Olaf the Stout]

I demand pictures!
Have you checked pogre's painting tips thread? There are some tricks to "help" you - I learned a lot from them... when I picked up painting last summer!
Nah, drybrushing is evil! To more precise: I've found drybrushing is much more useful for bringing out fine textures (fur, hair, scales) - cloth and many other things are far too large for drybrushing.
Look at my mini thread - the very first miniatures are highlighted by drybrushing (best seen on the Lich) - and it took a lot of time and I had the same problems as you.
Then I moved on to blending - the first try was the mind flayer - I wasn't bold enough, not enough contrast. Later on, I became bolder, as seen on the ranger and the dark cleric with the glowing skull.

And I have to say, I find blending a far superior and more controlled technique than washing and drybrushing.

Cheers, LT.

Pictures should be forthcoming sometime in the next week or so. I'd like to get the mini finished before I photograph it. I also have to figure out how to properly use the macro feature on my camera so that it's not blurry when I do photograph it.

As for pogre's thread, that's already been bookmarked! There's a lot of good advice and tips on the internet that I am taking advantage of.

As for drybrushing, I have found it really useful for higlighting the raised areas on the boots and folds of the cloak. Also, by lightly drybrushing the flatter areas of the boots and cloak I have found that I have been able to remove a lot of the "flatness" of colour that was there before.

I have been doing a bit of blending in the folds of the cloak, adding more and more black to my dark green paint and painting it into the folds. I have then been drybrushing it to even out and blend in the different shades. I have found that the drybrushing is really good and evening out and blending in the different shades. Is there another method for doing this?

Olaf the Stout

 

[WhatGravitas]

I have found that the drybrushing is really good and evening out and blending in the different shades. Is there another method for doing this?

Well... I'm also talking about blending for the upper parts, by mixing a appropriate brighter colour into it... (which isn't always white or even an off-white, as I've learned to my dismay).

For evening out: 1) Doing more steps of blending. I blend about 3-4 steps towards the darker colour and 3-4 steps to the brighter colour. Then I glaze the area to make it a bit more even and more "on colour".

A tip about glazing, I've read (and it works pretty well): Mix your paint with water until it starts to get translucent. Load your brush, wipe off the excess, then make a single stroke over a newspaper - if you can still read everything below the stroke (i.e. it is translucent), it's thin enough.

And then, apply that translucent colour to your blended area, and because the excess water is wiped off, it (should) stay on the stroked area and doesn't flow into crevices too much.

This glazing is actually a pretty nice technique, and I'm playing around with it a lot, currently. You can actually blend by applying it successively, as it slowly builds up. Also fun: You can "tint" things... this weekend, I've painted a goblin (picture forthcoming), by doing the skin from brown to bone colour, then glazed over it with 1-2 layers of green. It looks more natural than straight green, I quite like it.

Of course, I'm far from being good at painting, so you should probably wait until pogre flies into the thread!

Cheers, LT.

 

[pogre]

1. I'm very slow at painting!


2. Always make sure you completely scrape off all the mould lines off of your mini before you start painting.

3. Faces are hard to paint.

4. Shading is hard to keep!

1. You will get much faster with better results.

2. Yep - I still do this from time-to-time. These days I usually bite the bullet and go ahead and file down the flash line and repaint. Prep time drives me nuts, but it's worth it in the end.

3. Yep again - Go with tri-color shading and a simple eye method. I still struggle with blends on these areas. The Confrontation guys do some amazing things with glazes on skin tones - I have had some success with blushing glazes. Do check out Jen Haley's site for her article on painting faces. Be warned! She makes it look easy.

4. Hmmm, I'm with LT on this one. Large areas like capes usually call for wet-blending for me.

The great thing about painting is everyone develops their own style. Last year there was a Golden Demon winner that I know for a fact used a fair amount of dry brushing. So, as always, it comes down to what works for you!

 

[Olaf the Stout]

Well if I thought that faces are hard, I was wrong. Faces are easy compared to eyes!

I thought they would be quite difficult but after I did the first one I was wondering what was so hard about it after all. My first eye was about as good as I could have hoped for. The second eye proved to be my downfall. After about 4 or 5 attempts at it I finally had to settle for one good eye and one average looking eye.

I'm keeping in mind that this is my first mini in a long time so I'm trying not to be too hard on myself. I did realise that I need to order those Windsor & Newton brushes soon though. Painting fine details like eyes with a brush that has a slight hook just makes a difficult job even harder.

Olaf the Stout

 

[Blackrat]

Well if I thought that faces are hard, I was wrong. Faces are easy compared to eyes!

I thought they would be quite difficult but after I did the first one I was wondering what was so hard about it after all. My first eye was about as good as I could have hoped for. The second eye proved to be my downfall. After about 4 or 5 attempts at it I finally had to settle for one good eye and one average looking eye.

I'm keeping in mind that this is my first mini in a long time so I'm trying not to be too hard on myself. I did realise that I need to order those Windsor & Newton brushes soon though. Painting fine details like eyes with a brush that has a slight hook just makes a difficult job even harder.

Olaf the Stout

Grow a beard . That solves your eye-painting problem. Whenever I paint the eyes I just pluck a hair of my beard with tweezers and holding it close to the end with the tweezers I use it as a brush. Works miracles .

 

[Olaf the Stout]

Grow a beard . That solves your eye-painting problem. Whenever I paint the eyes I just pluck a hair of my beard with tweezers and holding it close to the end with the tweezers I use it as a brush. Works miracles .

I'm not sure if you're serious or not. If you are serious, doesn't the paint dry on your strand of hair before you get it to the mini?

Olaf the Stout

 

[Blackrat]

I'm serious. I do it myself whenever I need to do some really really small details, but yeah, it tends to dry pretty fast so using paints that don't dry as fast is a good idea.

 

[Doug Sundseth]

I generally paint the eyes before the rest of the face, which rather obviates the extreme need for precision in painting. Paint the eye area white; paint a stripe in the color of the iris; then paint a narrow stripe or small dot for the pupil. Once this has been done to your satisfaction, use a shadow shade of your basic skin color to cover the overpaint areas around the eye and then paint the rest of the face.

I find that a good #2 brush works fine for this. (FWIW, I use the same brush to paint the eyes on 15mm figures.)