Advanced techniques / considerations for painting display minis

[Boltman]

In light of many recent questions I received, I decided to write here general guidelines to what I recently learned about teh finer end of painting miniatures. This is a bare basic article, no pitures, typoes, etc, but it is all the time I have to afford right now. I will be putting these techniques to use in a little while (few weeks)and will post results to talk about. Nevertheless, for those willing to sit down and read my babble, you may find something of use. This is aimed at the painter with some experience, beginners beware. This may not be new to you, then I say what are you waiting for, show us your work! Finally, keep in mind that parts of this I figured out on my own from looking at other people's work, but most I was simply thought through questions and teachings of J

[-Q-]

Thank you very much for taking the time to write this all out. Priceless to have a Slayer Sword winner post their thoughts and opinions as they themselves progress.

 

EDIT: DUDE... That was your 777th post!!! It's Holy. Cool!

[Ahmato]

Thank you very much for taking the time to write this all out. Priceless to have a Slayer Sword winner post their thoughts and opinions as they themselves progress.

 

EDIT: DUDE... That was your 777th post!!! It's Holy. Cool!

 

Yeah; What he said :wink:

 

Thanks Boltman :)

[Chronophague]

Intersting read Boltman, I sorta felt transported back to "color theory" lectures a few years back ;) I've yet to actually attempt a "showcase" model, but reading this stuff makes me want to try to paint something for longer than a few evenings.

 

I look forward to seeing you applying these techniques to models. :lol:

 

Cheers

[death given form]

Chrono... your gaming quality is my display quality... Same goes for you Boltman... :lol: Interesting read, now all I have to do is go buy models to paint!!

[mario]

Nice post Boltman. I don't have a camera so I will just add some more theory to your post.

 

I will add just a few little things that worka bit differnt in my pointof view (use it if you think it useful to you).

First this: http://www.itchy-animation.co.uk/light.htm (I think I have spammed this link a lot in the PCA section) :lol:. This link should be helpful for anyone who want to learn a bit more about light and how it works.

 

On the first paragraph ("This is where you must determine ..."). He wrote that you should picture your miniature in the dark under a spotlight and that is something that you should do but only for your primary light source. If you want realistic light then that is not enough and will look lifeless/sterile because in reality we have the whole atmosphere that is boucing light around. Everything you see is in fact reflecting light (or you wouldn't see it ;)) and a light source even if it's weak compared to the sun.

 

I think that is something that should be remembered because otherwise you end up like some people on CMON who just copy someone elses SE-NMM paint combination and wonder why it doesn't look as good as the inspiration one. Colour is very relative and how it looks always depends in neighbouring colours and the whole thing. You can't just isolate colours. This shows colour relativity. Just try the three examples.

 

In the next one ("To brighten a color, you...") where he writes about shoes being darker than shoulders being darker than heads you essentially need to remember that this effect normally depends on the shadows. If you use sun light on a human being then there is not much happening (that we can see) in a distance of about 2m (6 feet) in real life (feet to head). The dynamic parts depend on shadows and lights from itself and the surrounding environment. So if you have some dynamic pose where the foot is very far outside you can highlight it rather bright but would probably have to darken some other parts that are covered by weapons and other things.

 

On what colours to use for shading and highlighting:

The nature of our colour perception is that when we see something and then look at something else the threshold of the complement is lowered. As an exercise you could take two sheets of white paper. On one paint a square in one colour and on the other paint nothing. Look focused on the painted square and then quickly look at the middle of your blank white paper. You should see an after image of the painted colour's complementary colour. Because our perception works this way the parts near a lightsource and the parts that are in the shadows tend to be complementary too. So if your main light source (that defines your miniatures mood) is the sun then you have a white (probably a bit yellowish) light. So you can use a mix of white and yellow and add this to your basecolour for highlights. And for shading the miniature use the complementary colour of your base colour and add a bit of purple (the complement of this light source). If you want to paint a miniauture is a mecahnical environment with bluish lights then you would add some blue to the white and add some orange to the basecolour complement for the shading.

 

For the green armour that Boltman mentioned: use the green you want as a basecolour, for highlights we will use an orange light. So we will add a mix of orange and white to the green (not much orange or won't be a "light" anymore). And for shading we will use red (green's complement) for the shading mixed with a bit of blue (the lights complement) to tie the lights and shadows into this part of the miniature (both added to the base colour). Everything you paint will get this additional orange and blue in it's mix. The colours itself won't really be visible (as you don't add much) but will draw the miniature under this one light and make it look less of an combination of painted pieces.

 

For his blue example: Using a yellow (sun like) light source the blue will look a bit teal/green in the highlights (white with a bit yellow) and would look desaturated (adding orange to the blue) and a bit purplish (light's complement).

 

All this is from what I have absorbed form different sources on colour theory. Don't take this as the truth or any other absolute value. That's just my interpretation and thinking of a lot of different sources.

[RayGun924]

Very interesting and useful read. Though I have a question. I have never taken any art classes save those in middle school and elementary school so I'm unfamiliar with color theory.

 

How do you go about shading darker colors such as say purple or blue? Would you still use complementary colors, i.e. yellow and orange respectively? For instance, say I was painting Crimson Fists, would I add orange to the Regal Blue? And would this work also for highlights, say, using Bad Moon Yellow with Imperial Purple?

 

Thanks for the tips, Boltman. Can't wait to see what you've done after employing these techniques.

 

~Ray

[Hemal]

Lovely article - the addition of photos, and this is a keeper - i'll ask the PC&A mods to sticky this.. :lol:

[Boltman]

I believe the addition of complementary color is only efficient at shading. As you add pigments, of any color, you tend to darken the color and in the end all colors mixed in, you get a very dark brownish result. So to brighten, use pale colors, close to white, with a hue of another color, such as yellowish, bluish, greyish, as this will highten the lighting effect, mimicing a colored lightsource.

 

My only example is the latest piece I made, Galadriel, which is not relevant to this board. (Look it up on CMON)

 

 

Boltman

[mario]

How do you go about shading darker colors such as say purple or blue? Would you still use complementary colors, i.e. yellow and orange respectively? For instance, say I was painting Crimson Fists, would I add orange to the Regal Blue? And would this work also for highlights, say, using Bad Moon Yellow with Imperial Purple?

For shading dark colours (not juts blue or puruple) complementary colours work but be careful to to not use too much of something too bright, in that case it would probably be better to not mix because mixing with bright colours could raise your value (brightness). For that it would be better to use washes/glazes (but not with inks, use normal paint that yu thin down) of the complementary colour. All the layers of transparent overlaying hues should absorb more evenly from the whole spectrum and reflect less of everything.

 

Adding complementary colour for highlighting doesn't work. Highlights ae places where the light gets refleted better. And mixing these colour in real will result in a colour that absorbs from both of these mixed colours. So you get less reflected colour. You can try it and use more white to compensate for the missing chroma with value but it will create a effect that is not exactly what you expect :lol:. It would remove a lot of your basecolours chroma. So it could be useful for very pale colour (so you don't have too much simple white) on your miniatures.

[Artimis Vergadin]

Thanks a ton Boltman! You're the ownage right about now, my painting level has definitely increased!

 

Cheers!

Artimis

[Boltman]

Always happy to help Artimis :lol: Those new pics you sent are indeed a good improvement, I'll comment further tomorrow...

 

Boltman

[Gryphin]

very cool... I never really knew about the whole shading with complementary colors thing. I'm gonna have to do that with some future models.

[Hertz]

wow, there are lots of interesting pieces of knowledge here! nice! :lol:

both to my God Boltman, and Mario (artshool?) thanks! ^_^

[HuronBH]

Wow, great article Boltman and great aditions Mario. This was very informative. For a long time I have been experimenting with several techniques and contemplationg changing my painting style. Traditionally I paint using the GW method, layers of color to highlight up with ink washes used to help improve blending. I have however experiment for a long time with using a light sources to guide my highlights, not just highlighting to the edges which tends to create a very flashy look. Also since last summer i have been experimenting with the multiple thin layering over white technique you discussed, but always using inks and not diluted paint layers, and in no where near that many layers(15 to 20). I tend to dilute my paints when using the layering method in the way you discussed so I think I have a strong grasp of what you are getting at.

 

There are however several things that I learned. One is the verying level of highlight compared to the height of the highlight on the model, I never would have thought of that. Also I had Ali McVey try to explain the shading technique you discussed adding a complimenary color or blue to increase dept and not washing out of my shades to me last year at Gencon Indy, however I did not understand it. Your explaination helps alot and I have some ideas on how to try this out.

 

Thank you very much, I have a feeling this is going to help my painting improve greatly. Now if I could just get my head around NMM I'll be set.

 

 

-jay

[mario]

Now if I could just get my head around NMM I'll be set.

Well NMM is nothing different than painting how light is being reflected for a very shiny surface. That's how metals reflect light in comparison to things that reflect light more diffuse. So if you know how to paint cloth real then you should be able to paint metal real. You just need to change the reflectivity. Once you understand all the different building blocks then you can paint anything. Just get some reference photos so you have something where you can see how that specific surface is reflecting light and then adapt it to your surface and lighting conditions.

[JTDemon]

very interesting read , definitly going to try and take this into account when I next get around to doing some painting.

[Dr Death]

Well i've been reading up on ways to better my painting technique and this entire concept of shading with a complementary colour and desaturation and all the rest of it has come up a number of times but i have to say, not really being an artist and knowing much about colour theory it was all a bit confusing, but now that you have actually "shown the way" referencing actual colours i think i've got more of a handle on it than i had.

 

What about shading black? How do i make my shadows look deeper and my highlights look more realistic?

 

Dr Death

[HellChyld]

after reading about all the new teachings and learning of new painting styles and techs would someone be so polite as to help me contact cyril? as his style of painting on amarine has been my favorite since 2004. I've tried replicating it several times but failed miserably. with my new project I'd love to get some pointers on his tech and see if I could finally pull it off on a black armoured marine(s). if contact isn't possible maybe some illumination into his style would be just as greatly accepted?

[mario]

Hertz: Curiosity, not artschool :unsure:

 

Dr Death: It has nothign to do with being an artist (I am not), just with curiosity and practice (a lot). Just buy normal acrylic paint (yellow, orange, red, purple, blue, green, black, white) and some cheap brushes and try mixing. These paints are cheaper for experiments so you can make bigger blobs of paint.

 

For the black: Don't paint with pure black. Paint everything else a bit brighter than you normally would (just a little bit). And instead of black use something that is nearly black (mixing green and purple can sometimes be useful, if it's too dark add some grey). This dark colour will be your black because your other stuff is a bit brighter there will be a value contast (very bright versus ver dark). Now you can add bkack for shading and use it pure for blacklining. In the same way (not really the same) that complementary coloours contrast each other and that pale and very saturated colours support each other do bright and dark colour work together. In a post above I linked to a site with colour perception experiments. Try these and you will see how colour perception depends on neighbouring colour. We don't see things isolated from each other.

 

Nephren-ka: http://neomodel.free.fr/index02.html is Cyril's site. His e-mail can be found under e-mail. But there are enough pictures and articles. And you can always look in the CMON articles section. He has some tutorials there (in english). And babelfish.altavista.com is good enough for understanding the translations.

[Boltman]

Since mario seems keen on jumping in to answer questions, I'll let him do just that.

 

 

 

Boltman

[Legacy40k]

Very educational Boltman, now my question is, how do you apply this to white armour and still make it look like white armour?

 

-Legacy40k

[mario]

Since mario seems keen on jumping in to answer questions, I'll let him do just that.

 

 

 

Boltman

Well you started a very interesting topic, the last few days were rather eventless, and we had bad weather here. I had some time. If you have something to add or a different opinion just say it, more inforamtion is always better.

 

 

Very educational Boltman, now my question is, how do you apply this to white armour and still make it look like white armour?

 

-Legacy40k

I thought I could grab this question while I'm here. :lol:

 

If it's something that is very reflective and white then you will have a darker basecoat because all the surrounding is reflected very good in the white. So if your miniature is in a green field then you could mix white with Rotting Fleish (a pale green grey) for the basecoat (or use Rotting Flesh as your basecoat). For the blacklining just add a bit orange, red or purple for warm, neutral or cold shadows, I would pick the orange as the rest of the white will be rather cold.

Shade with care so if you have a rather open form then don't go too dark, just add a few layers of the shading colour as a glaze in the to be shaded areas (a bit like a wash). For parts that are in deeper shadows use more layers of your glaze and add some more paint to darken it.

Because it's highly reflective you should use pure white only for specular highlights (even though it won't be as visible as with NMM grey armours and swords). The main part of your white will be some Rotting Flesh and white mix or pure Rotting Flesh (the darker the more shadows you are reprsenting around your miniature).

 

For a white that is not extremely shiny you just need to blend from basecoat to white in an much bigger area (like the whole area, with "blacklining" as the real shading). That way your basecoat from the above paragraph is your shading colour in this version. This will give you less value change over a bigger area (erepresenting a diffuse reflection) compared to the very shiny area in the paragraph above.

 

Keep your blending clean and controlled will make the white look more clean and real.

 

Here the rambling writing from the paragraphs above as a table.

Type of White	   Blacklining	   Shading	   Basecoat	   Highlight	   Final Highlight
Shiny White		 ++ orange		+ orange	 Rotting Flesh	+ white		  pure white
Non-Shiny White	 + orange	   Rotting Flesh	 +white		++ white		 pure white

 

this should work if you want a white for something that is surrounded by something green and in an more cool atmosphere. If your Space Marines have a lot of equipment that is red or black then you can shade the white near that equipent my adding these to some general basecolour of Fortress Grey an white. It's more work but it should give you a less artficial white.

[Legacy40k]

Okay, so what if you want to paint white models, on snow bases?

 

-Legacy40k

[Chronophague]

Okay, so what if you want to paint white models, on snow bases

I don't see the problem?

 

Cheers