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[WhenTheSkinksMarch]

So I have only been interested in Warhammer for about a year, I got a friends old HE army for cheap. I was attempting to get into mini painting for D&D, and he suggested the buy as practice, I still haven't gotten around to painting them all yet, but let's just say I'm not going to run out of models for a while. I found myself drawn to the Seraphon soon after that, I found a SC box at my local store, and fell in love with the idea and general aesthetic of the little guys. Soon after that another friend sold off his old army cheap, mostly prepainted though, pretty solidly too so I'm not too sure if I want to strip them and redo at my current level
I've only been painting seriously for about 3 months, I tried to do a mini here or there beforehand but very rarely. And as of this point I have completely painted about 7 skinks, a SCE model I picked up from the GW start playing magazine, a High Elf commander, and about 4 HE archers.
I really intend to learn and get better as I go, so please rip me a new one on the criticism, I want to learn. What I'm trying to pickup at the moment is the finer points of highlighting, and how to mix/blend paints on the model for colour transitions.
Sorry about taking these pictures on a potato, I'm hoping to upgrade phones soon

 

[Crowsfoot]

Lets start at the beginning,

Thin your paints a bit or apply 2 thin coats to get a nice even coverage, I should do the same.

Shade should be applied again evenly don't let it puddle on the model.

Highlights are hard to grasp so as a new painter learn how to drybrush, a month of drybrushing and you will know how highlights work.

Don't fall into the trap of using loads of different colours I tend to stick to around 5 and it works quite well.

Don't be afraid to make mistakes and when you do accept it and move on, you learn by doing it wrong.

 

[Aginor]

Not much to add to that.
I think using a wet palette would help a lot to have your colors be a bit thinner/smoother.

It looks like you are off to a good start though, your precision looks good already.

 

[WhenTheSkinksMarch]

Lets start at the beginning,

Thin your paints a bit or apply 2 thin coats to get a nice even coverage, I should do the same.

Shade should be applied again evenly don't let it puddle on the model.

Highlights are hard to grasp so as a new painter learn how to drybrush, a month of drybrushing and you will know how highlights work.

Don't fall into the trap of using loads of different colours I tend to stick to around 5 and it works quite well.

Don't be afraid to make mistakes and when you do accept it and move on, you learn by doing it wrong.

I thought I was thinning, am I not thinning it enough? Is there a baseline or something to tell me how thinned the paint should be? At the moment for every dip of paint on the brush I do a dip of water to go with it
Same with shades, I thought you wanted some visible ink, not a lot, but some, showing.
My friends have actually told me the opposite, that drybrushing is a lot harder to master/do right (I can't remember their exact words), rather than highlighting. Is it easier than they made it out to be? I've seen some of WHTV's clips and it does look easy enough.
I'm trying to keep my colour schemes simple enough, I don't think I could handle any large amount of colours, on the skinks I have a base skin, a lighter skin on the top parts of the model, then the highlights, the gold and highlights for gold, and the green and nuln oil to make the blades.

 

[Crowsfoot]

Thin them until they flow nicely on your palette, plate etc

Yes you want visible shade but no so it clogs detail

Drybrushing is easier than layers, you could drybrush your first highlight them spot highlight more precisely.

Your models look decent but on the shoulder pad of the stormcast it looks lumpy?

 

[Deed525]

I thought I was thinning, am I not thinning it enough? Is there a baseline or something to tell me how thinned the paint should be? At the moment for every dip of paint on the brush I do a dip of water to go with it
Same with shades, I thought you wanted some visible ink, not a lot, but some, showing.
My friends have actually told me the opposite, that drybrushing is a lot harder to master/do right (I can't remember their exact words), rather than highlighting. Is it easier than they made it out to be? I've seen some of WHTV's clips and it does look easy enough.
I'm trying to keep my colour schemes simple enough, I don't think I could handle any large amount of colours, on the skinks I have a base skin, a lighter skin on the top parts of the model, then the highlights, the gold and highlights for gold, and the green and nuln oil to make the blades.

Dry brushing is a piece of cake - get the colour you want - dab a small amount on a brush you don’t mind ruining - wipe most of it of on tissue paper etc then apply (this can be done in multiple layers of slightly different colours all the way to white...if you so wish)

Mixing colours is a brilliant way to highlight or add depth - simple way to do it is get the colour you want (darkest first) and the lightest colour you want to go to then apply the first coat (thin) on its own, next ink if you want it (usually worth doing to bring out highlighted areas and shade inset ones) then mix the darkest colour 3:1 with the lightest - when dry 2:1 then 1:1, if you want to go lighter on certain areas then start using the lightest colour on its own for edging and if that light colour isn’t white - mix 1:1 white as well.

For a first time painter try simply just basing the area you want - add a thick layer of ink (pushing to the areas you want shaded most) when fully dry apply the same paint from before in a thin layer on top of highlighted areas then mix 2:1 with a lighter colour usually white for very thin edging - there you go easy defined colours.

May I suggest if you are worried about how the colours will look on the model before painting it - mix colours on a piece of white card and shade them up/down until you see something you like.

 

[WhenTheSkinksMarch]

Not much to add to that.
I think using a wet palette would help a lot to have your colors be a bit thinner/smoother.

It looks like you are off to a good start though, your precision looks good already.

(Sorry I really thought I had replied to this) Thanks for the compliment, now that I know what a wet palette is I am definitely putting one on my next painting supplies buy list

 

[WhenTheSkinksMarch]

Thin them until they flow nicely on your palette, plate etc

Yes you want visible shade but no so it clogs detail

Drybrushing is easier than layers, you could drybrush your first highlight them spot highlight more precisely.

Your models look decent but on the shoulder pad of the stormcast it looks lumpy?

Thanks for the advice, I'll try and keep a closer eye on my paint consistency, I am currently using a pretty small palette so it can be a little hard for me to properly judge, but when I get a bigger one that should help. Same with the shade, I'll keep a closer watch on how it runs and where it pools/ends up.
As for drybrushing, I will give it a shot, I've got a buggered brush I can use and some base coated skinks to highlight, so I'll do a few of them up and post the results.
The Stormcast pauldron was the unfortunate victim of a poor spray when undercoating in the Australian summer, thankfully the rest went on smooth.

 

[WhenTheSkinksMarch]

Dry brushing is a piece of cake - get the colour you want - dab a small amount on a brush you don’t mind ruining - wipe most of it of on tissue paper etc then apply (this can be done in multiple layers of slightly different colours all the way to white...if you so wish)

Mixing colours is a brilliant way to highlight or add depth - simple way to do it is get the colour you want (darkest first) and the lightest colour you want to go to then apply the first coat (thin) on its own, next ink if you want it (usually worth doing to bring out highlighted areas and shade inset ones) then mix the darkest colour 3:1 with the lightest - when dry 2:1 then 1:1, if you want to go lighter on certain areas then start using the lightest colour on its own for edging and if that light colour isn’t white - mix 1:1 white as well.

For a first time painter try simply just basing the area you want - add a thick layer of ink (pushing to the areas you want shaded most) when fully dry apply the same paint from before in a thin layer on top of highlighted areas then mix 2:1 with a lighter colour usually white for very thin edging - there you go easy defined colours.

May I suggest if you are worried about how the colours will look on the model before painting it - mix colours on a piece of white card and shade them up/down until you see something you like.

Thanks for the tutorials, I'll definitely give these a shot and see how they go. I will be doing some drybrushing in the coming days, and will post the completed results when everything is done. Mixing might take me a little longer, I'll try it on some of the skinks I've yet to do, hopefully it will turn out well for my first go.

 

[WhenTheSkinksMarch]

Ok, so drybrushing went a lot easier than I thought it would, and turned out pretty decently I think, I took some pictures with an older painted skink as a comparison. Thanks for the suggestions guys, I think I'll be using this technique a fair bit.

 

[Crowsfoot]

Thing is with drybrushing it is the basis of all your painting, you will use it on every mini you paint, yes you will learn to layer and blend but good old faithful will be there ready and waiting.

 

[Deed525]

Thing is with drybrushing it is the basis of all your painting, you will use it on every mini you paint, yes you will learn to layer and blend but good old faithful will be there ready and waiting.

Yes indeed once you start it becomes a ‘go-to’ lol, you can easily layer with dry brushing alone for a pretty solid effect on most models without compromising detail, as with all things it’s about practise and being brave enough to test new things
I’ve never done small details on scaled models but I fully intend to very soon, deep breaths lol

 

[WhenTheSkinksMarch]

Ok, so a long time of me telling myself to paint ended with not much happening. Then my holiday came around and I spent the next month bussing around Scandinavia (Beautiful place if you haven't been, highly recommend a visit at some point if you can afford to). Another month and a bunch of purchases later I finally got back to my paints and brush.
And then this guy came about, the first of my warriors, I went with a standard blue skin and on a friends suggestion sprung for green scales, it was my idea to let the dark stripe down the central scales. I still need to clean up a few spots, glaze where the scale colours meet, highlight the shield and then move on to the other 20-odd warriors. As always, comments and criticisms are encouraged. Thanks in advance!

 

[Crowsfoot]

Interesting scheme, you want to go really light with your blue highlights.

 

[WhenTheSkinksMarch]

Interesting scheme, you want to go really light with your blue highlights.

Thanks, unfortunately highlights are not my specialty so I'm leaving them for the moment and am going to come back to them at cleanup. Where I can get a clear vision of how and where I want them. But I will take that into consideration when I work on them!

 

[Crowsfoot]

Thanks, unfortunately highlights are not my specialty so I'm leaving them for the moment and am going to come back to them at cleanup. Where I can get a clear vision of how and where I want them. But I will take that into consideration when I work on them!

Mainly round the mouth, knuckles, knees

Warrior skin is very easy to highlight

 

[WhenTheSkinksMarch]

Mainly round the mouth, knuckles, knees

Warrior skin is very easy to highlight

Thanks! I will get to that tomorrow hopefully! And post results of course

 

[Warden]

+1 to green lizardmen!

 

[WhenTheSkinksMarch]

Alright here we go, highlights and touch ups done, I also did up another that was half started at the same time.

For all the shield work and golds on the second model, and all the highlights on both I used my new homemade water palette. Which I am so glad I finally got around to making, this makes painting and mixing so much easier

 

[ravagekitteh]

Looking really good!