Question: Highlighting black by inking down from grey spray

[jlmb_123]

Morning,

 

I'm doing a Ravenwing army and was looking for a  good way to highlight the black. I found this excellent tutorial a few weeks ago and quite fancy the idea of priming black, spraying in the highlights then toning them with ink. However, I don't have an airbrush. Would using Army Painter Uniform Grey work or would it be too stark and the lack of pressure control difficult?

[Kriegsmacht]

I did something similar to some Iron Hands using a tutorial I found on here. Instead I sprayed the miniature black, then painted it with Adeptus battlegrey(was the darkest I had) leaving the recesses black. Then I washed the whole miniature with Nuln Oil three times. After the third time it was dark enough then highlighted the edges. Came out really good in my opinion.

[Sol_Invictus]

I did something similar to some Iron Hands using a tutorial I found on here. Instead I sprayed the miniature black, then painted it with Adeptus battlegrey(was the darkest I had) leaving the recesses black. Then I washed the whole miniature with Nuln Oil three times. After the third time it was dark enough then highlighted the edges. Came out really good in my opinion.

 

Mind posting a pic with the result?

[Flint13]

Cool beans, thanks for the tutorial! That's a pretty gritty Ravenwing. They certainly aren't as eye catching as something that's edge highlighted super high, but they do have a really unique realistic matte look to them I really dig.

 

I'm guessing using a brush with AP uniform gray wouldn't be too much of a jump, but I'm betting it would take longer. I'm thinking the key is going to be a bunch of super thin coats to build up shadows where you want them (think like reverse edge highlighting) so that'll take a good deal of patience on your part. But it should also give you awesome control compared to an airbrush!

 

@ Kreig - That sounds pretty sweet. Do you have any pics?

[Kriegsmacht]

Yeah here's the results of two of my Iron hands

 

 

 

Edit: I just looked in the paint tutorial section. I took this idea from Captain_Volos

[jlmb_123]

That black's nice, it's a lot more matte than I'd expect for inks. i especially like your boltguns, I'd never dare try to paint white guns!

[Kriegsmacht]

Thanks I'm painting them as they're shown in their Index Astartes article hence the white bolter. One tip captain_volos said in his tutorial is to shake the Nuln Oil wash a lot or else it will look glossy. Also there's a patch of grey on the bare headed marines right boot. It's not that noticeable in person the flash must be exposing it more.

[SW1]

For iron hands I found drybrushing the grey over the back base coat effective as multiple layers of wash hides the messiness. Before the final wash I slapped the metallics with boltgun and the washed the entire thing.

 

I'll dig up some pics.

[Kriegsmacht]

I tried a little experiment on my next two Iron Hands by highlighting the grey before washing. Some spots it worked ok but others it's not that noticeable.