How I paint black armor

[Stix]

Hello!

I have been asked few times about my black armor recipe so I have made that quick step by step tutorial on how I do it. I hope it will be useful to someone :)

[Johanhgg]

Really nice work! I love it! Do you apply wash multiple times? Reason i ask is that the grey is a long way from the black that is the final result?

[Stix]

Thanks! No, only once. NATO black looks very light in relation to black but as soon as you start adding graphite and wash it is darkening nicely.

[Johanhgg]

Thanks alot man! Ill give it a shot! Thanks for the inspiration!

[Son of Sacrifice]

Nice and simple and super effective dirty black, that marine's armour looks so real I can smell it. Thanks for sharing.

[Kolgrim DeathHowl]

That's really neat how you paint them, great guide!

[Imren]

Ace process! Simple and looks great!. It as a vibe of being inspired by military modellers, the graphite pencil weathering and oil washer is an old-school standard among those dudes!

[Stix]

Thanks a lot! Yes, you are right. I like more realistic look of models so when I started my IH force I was watching tons of scale modellers tutorials on yt from where I have picked up those things.:)

[Brother Desultor]

Simple but very effective! I am definitely going to try this myself. 

 

Step 4, the oil wash - is that directly over the paint without a traditional gloss varnish beforehand? And does it matter much about the ratio of black to burnt umber?

 

Sorry for the pesky questions....

[Imren]

I would do a gloss varnish coat after step three before pin washing the recesses with oil paints. Because:

• You do your decal work after paint coats done but before weathering, so you want a gloss coat to protect your paint job against decal softener and decal fixer.
• With gloss varnish coat the oil wash runs much smoother when applying.
• With gloss varnish coat it is easier to manipulate the oil paint (tidying up excess and pooling) as the white spirit has dried because it is less prone to staining the underlying paint coat when its on a gloss coat.

 

When doing the oil wash I recommend to put the oil paint on a piece of regular shipping box cardboard (the brown one in double layers with corrugated layer in between) to soak out the lineseed oil out of the paint for an hour or two. Then the oil wash will dry quicker and you won't need to wait so long to do the tidying.

 

The ratio doesn't really matter much, as long as it is runny as an acrylic wash. Oil washes are waaaaay more forgiving than acrylic ones (like GW washes/shades) since you can still manipulate them after the white spirit you thin them with has evaporated, it takes a day for the oil paint it to dry and several days to cure completely.

[Brother Desultor]

I would do a gloss varnish coat after step three before pin washing the recesses with oil paints. Because:

 

• You do your decal work after paint coats done but before weathering, so you want a gloss coat to protect your paint job against decal softener and decal fixer.
• With gloss varnish coat the oil wash runs much smoother when applying.
• With gloss varnish coat it is easier to manipulate the oil paint (tidying up excess and pooling) as the white spirit has dried because it is less prone to staining the underlying paint coat when its on a gloss coat.

 

When doing the oil wash I recommend to put the oil paint on a piece of regular shipping box cardboard (the brown one in double layers with corrugated layer in between) to soak out the lineseed oil out of the paint for an hour or two. Then the oil wash will dry quicker and you won't need to wait so long to do the tidying.

 

The ratio doesn't really matter much, as long as it is runny as an acrylic wash. Oil washes are waaaaay more forgiving than acrylic ones (like GW washes/shades) since you can still manipulate them after the white spirit you thin them with has evaporated, it takes a day for the oil paint it to dry and several days to cure completely.

That's how I usually do oil washes - the traditional method. I was asking the OP how they did theirs in this particular instance

[Stix]

Oh I don't use gloss varnish (but, as Imren said, I probably should :P ) When it comes to ratio of oil wash, I try to get cosistency of GW washes. I also tend to start with more black then umber and when it is dry and if I need more brown areas (like legs for eg.) I repeat with a little bit more brow in the mix.

[Brother Desultor]

Much appreciated, thank you.