8/12/2019 What I Wish I Had Known 3

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am not saying its a conspiracy and that theres an Illuminati of painters that jealousy hold ontothe secrets of pro pa inting, protecting it from the world, Im just s aying theres a lot of things thatto them seem like common knowledge and often dont get shared with the new guys. This infor-mation isnt impossible to nd if youre looking for it, but you ca nt look for what you dont knowexists. So, what are the few gems of knowledge Ive managed to uncover from the ancient temple

Wet PalletThis was another little gem I discovered only recently. Up until then I had been using Pri

ceramic tiles, Tupperware boxes, anything and everything to mix and hold my paint while I paintminis. The problem is paint dries quickly, and when youre painting up platoons of men and tanbe painting for some time.

The Wet Pallet works in such a way that your pa int is fed a constant supply of moisture anin your pallet for literally months. You will need to change t he water after a while so it doesnt gobut keep your water fresh and your mixed paint will last as long as you need it to.

I found this little bit of wisdom on Minutiae of Warthrough the WWPD Network page, achanged my painting experience entirely. Its essentially a bit of blister foam/paper towel/spongbottom of a Tupperware box with a sealable lid, with water saturating the foam. It then has a laygrease-proof paper over the top of it that you use as your pallet surface. Store it with its lid on andpaint will last a long, long time.

2B PencilI hate painting metallics; they b ehave differently to normal paint, turn to goo, and thinnin

with water tends to break them up. Although there are ways to prevent this, (you can use thinneones mentioned previously) I like to avoid metallic paints entirely when I can. When it comes to bage on my tanks or gun ba rrels on my guys, I like to paint the barrel German Grey and go over it graphite pencil. The result is something similar to GW Boltgun Metal, but much less hassle and twThis doesnt work well for large a reas, for instance armour plating on Impe rial Roman Legionnaionly works for silver metals like steel or iron, but its great for small areas of battled damaged tan

Dont Highlight with WhiteFor most of us it seems logical that to lighten a colour you just add white right? The probl

doesnt work with paint, as your nice blood red Blood Angels army just turned pink! Im sure thcolour theory in here but I wont go into it, - yellow highlights both red and green well, cyan wor

Near BlackAnother trap people fall in is highlighting black with white. Because black is quite literall

absence of colour, it is a difcult base colour to shade and highlight. The best solution to this is toblack. Near black, as its name suggests, is not quite black. This is achieved by adding in a bit of thlight colour to a black base coat, making it slightly tinted. This tint helps ease the transition to hig

For instance, when painting GW Necrons all those years ago, my base coat was black withhighlights. Id add a little bit of dark angels green to the black to tint it in the r ight direction and mple wouldnt notice that it wasnt quite black. Id then highlight with progressively brighter shadethrough to nearly yellow.

Personally, I like to highlight black with blue, which makes German Grey a perfect substitblack base-coat. Its slightly blue tint makes it easy to highlight and a dark wash can still add a littdepth to the recesses. Of course, the colour that you tint the model depends on the effect you areachieve. You might want to paint a navy blue tint for a nobleman or lord but a brown tint for coman assassin.

ConclusionSo these are the few little bits of information that Ive gleamed from the various corners of

in search of the painting holy grail. I hope these tips and tricks help you on your painting odysse

What I Wish I Had KnownAn Article by Arran Slee-Smith

http://rightsidecreative.co.uk

Iof the hobby Pros whilst ducking spears, out running giant boulders and dodging booby traps?

Natural Hair Paintbrushes vs. Synthetic.I covered this more in-depth in a previous article, but a quality natural hair brush provides better

ow, a sharper tip and does not curl at the end over time. This really was a revelation for me, why was I nottold!

Base Coat Your MinisThis will seem like a no brainer to most painters, everyone picks this one up pretty quickly, but ev-

eryone started out trying to paint directly onto plastic, metal or resin at some point, and, while its possibleto produce a decent painted mini with no base coat, youre really just starting your journey with a at tire.

Every single pro painter will start out with a base coat: it provides a surface for the paint to stick to,so your paint ow is smoot h and youre not pushing paint around your mini. Base coats can be applied bybrush, airbrush or the most common method, by spray can.

Preferred base-coat colour varies from person to person. White provides brighter more vibrantcolours but will show through if painting is not p erfect. Black helps hide any mistakes and gaps in hard to

reach areas, but dulls slightly. Grey is a good balance be tween the two. You can also go straight for the basecolour of the mini. Personally, I use German Grey for most projects.

Thin Your PaintsYou will hear this over and over again, but what does this mean? How much do you thin by? Whats

the ratio? What do you use to thin your paints?Everyone has a different answer, but the most common o ne Ive found is to thin your paint to about

the consistency of milk. Most people use regular plain old tap water, some swear by only ltered water, oth-ers swear by acrylic medium or Flow improver. Water will serve most novices well enough. The importantthing to remember is to use somethingto thin your paints. If you feel your method could be improved, trysome of the advanced products.

I personally just use tap water with a little drop of washing up liquid to break the surface tension ofthe water and give better ow once mixed with my paints. Remember its sometimes quicker and easier topaint multiple thin layers than it is to paint one solid block, a practice which can lead to you pushing paintaround and leaving an uneven coat.

GlazingNot all secrets are obscured to just novices. Ive been painting for years, and the several times Ive

experimented with advanced techniques like glazing have ended disastrously and honestly left me prettydown about my abilities as a painter. This has often left me in a place where I feel that my skills cant prog-ress much further.

Glazing is still something I know nothing about. This is my white whale, my holy grail. I have yet tond a tutorial that gives me that Eureka moment, and perhaps I never will. If anyone wants to give me themiracle answer to this p roblem, Id love you forever.