How to airbrush white

[Just Alexis]

Hey everyone, im looking to paint my army up, and im doing a base of white with gold trim and white robes/capes for my space marines and i just got a airbrush for my brithday, im looking at vallejo paints and everyone says to do a offwhite base with something over that then highlights but no one says what vallejo to use only the citadels and was wondering if anyone had tips?

 

[Warbringer]

I use Vallejo Light Grey Primer which is a cold grey and pretty good for a white base, i then generally use a vallejo game air dead white as my bright white.

 

Just shade it with thinned agrax or black.

 

I would say using the contrast apothecary white after would be a good call based on my tests with it. 

[Imren]

You could go two routes when in comes to painting white (or black):

• Paint with a pure grey gradient
• Paint with a slight colour tone in your grey gradient.

When you paint white you go for a light grey gradient were you highlight up to white. When doing this you either start from pure grey and go up to white, or you start with a grey with blue, green, brown tones (Same for black, start black and highlight up to a off white colour with some green, turquoise or purple tones in it).

 

If your other colours on the model will have have warm colours (reds, browns golds) then go for cold tones on your grey/white scale such as blue, purple, green, turqoise etc). And vice versa. Models/paintjobs look best when you contrast the main colours on models with warm and cool colours.

 

If you look around you you see that white isn't white and black isnt black, it has a slight colour tone to it depending on the reflected light's colour tone.

 

I suggest you go for a slight subtle coloured tone in you base grey and then highlight up to pure white.

 

Most white paints airbrushes quite grainy, even Vallejo air white. I have tried many whites through an airbrush to do detailed pre-highlighting with white after priming and also on top of base layers and highlights and I found that the best white paints for airbrush are:

• Tamiya flat white (Thin with Tamiya X20A thinner only)
• Medea Com art opaque white (thin with whatever thinner, already quite thin as is).

So I suggest the following procedure:

1. Prime your model by airbrushing grey primer with a wee bit of black primer (For Vallejo options I recommend Vallejo Mecha primers, they are more durable and scratch resistant than regular Vallejo primer). The wee bit of black in the primer will darken the primer up a bit so that you get more contrast for the next step.
2. Airbrush a pre-highlight layer with Com-art opaque white (or Tamiya flat white). This will show where the highlights should be placed. You either do the pre-highlight in a zenithal manner or as if the light source is coming from the sides.
3. Choose a grey with a colour tone. Here are some Vallejo suggestions (VMA = Vallejo Model Air). Airbrush that as a base layer all over the model.
   • Cold slight blue tone, choose either:
     • VMA Russian as heck Grey N.8 (71.345)
     • VMA Dark Ghost Gray (71.120)
   • Cold creamy tone:  VMA USAF Light Gray (71.276)
   • Colder purple-ish tone: VMA IJN Medium Grey (71.312)
   • Warm yellowish/greenish/khaki tone: VMA IJA Grey Green (71.326)
4. Airbrush a mix of the base colour above and white in a ration of 1:1 and airbrush this on the highlighted areas.
5. Do a pure white highlight on the protruding edges.
6. Airbrush gloss varnish thinned 1:1 all over the model.
7. Do a pin wash with a dark brown (van Dyke brown or burnt umber) oil paint diluted heavily in odourless artist's white spirit thinner. Use a round synthetic size 0-ish brush for this as the oil paint and thinner will ruin your nice Kolinsky brushes. After a couple of hours of drying clean up the excessive pooling with the same brush and clean white spirit.
8. Do your decals (with decal softener and fixer).
9. Do your details (eye lenses, armour joints, pouches, wargear etc).
10. Do your weathering with scratches, pitting (neatly sponge black or dark browns).
11. Seal in the model with satin varnish (Mix gloss and matt varnish in a ratio of 1:3 and dilute the mix 1:1 with thinner and do two coats).

 

Happy painting!