Painting Jam 16 - FAQ

posted by roman, jarhead, kong

Aloa to another round of the Painting Jam.
Still there are questions dropping in from everywhere around the planet. I am kind of exhausted by the latest Painting Class we had this weekend in Munich but before the mass of questions makes me so scared that i won't answer any of time i got to do a Painting Jam. There will be a review on the painting class in the next couple of days while i am already preparing the next one rolling in for the upcoming weekend. Now this is a time of massive Happy Painting :)

A little information about me and my time for answering your questions. I usually don't have much time, so please make sure you write me your answer in english language and via email to jarhead---at---massivevoodoo---dot---com. Make sure your email is titled with Painting Jam and your question topic, for example "Painting Jam - Space Wolf colours?" - so it is way more easier for me to keep control over the stuff i got to do. As i am active in several forums about Miniature Painting makes it not easy to have your question spread around the places and i often do not find the time to check all the forums for private messages. Now let's get it on :)


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Many people ask:

"How did u made such great appearance of sea board on the side of ur new postapocalyptic track ? It is so real!"

It is a crackle medium a company which is not from the miniature hobby. Some artistic stuff i can't remember the name of as Raffa did order some and my order did get lost in the wide of the web. Please be a little more patient as the easiest way for us here in the jungle is to write an article about it. There are so many questions about it all over the places that i prefer to put time into the article instead of saying the same thing a hundred times via private messages. I hope everyone can live with that. The article will bring you the information on how to use it and the little tips and tricks we already found out with this sort of thing.


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Shortonammo asks via email:

"Is it possible to tell me how you painted the Son of Russ - Brother Freyron I am trying to paint a space wolves army and I don't want to do the usual colors shadow grey....space wolves grey,
if you can help me it woukd make my year thanks you MASSIVE fan Shortonammo.


PS you should start making video tutorials for guys who do not live near Germany :("

My answer:

Sure it is possible, but i can't do a complete review on the whole process as i did not plan to put time and effort into a complete Step by Step guide at this model - i just wanted to paint at this model and enjoy painting. When time comes to the right spot i will do such things for sure in the future.

I guess the main question for you is about the armours colour, which is definatly not a shadow grey or space wolfs grey. I wanted to create my vision of the colour for this area and did start with a mix from several other colours to get this basic colour - the mix was build up from around 30% Dark Sea Green 70868 by Model Colour,  30% of german Feldgrau 338 by Panzer Aces, some Ivory 70918 by Model Colour (15%) and 25% of  Fenris Grey by Citadel Foundation Colour. This was my basic colour and please make sure it doesn't matter if the % are completly correct - try and mix the colour you like this is just my proposal and an idea of what i can remember. I then did start to paint my basiccolour and brought it into the light areas with addign Bleached Bone and finally a mix of Bleached Bone and Ivory (final edges). Shadows have been added by mixing in some Chaos Black into the basic colour. All placed by looking at the zenithal lightning situation. I hope these thoughts somehow help you and don't you take it for granted what i am telling you. Just try to mix your colour you want to have, take a deep look on the colour you are searching, is there some blue in it, is it more blue than grey or otherwise, is there some yellow in the lights or are they still in a cold colour... anaylise colour and train do mix it the way you want. Sure this won't work at the first go perfectly, but it is all about training the eye and your understanding of colours. Sorry for this kind of incomplete answer.

PS: Raffa planned to translate his video tutorial, but as it looks he doesn't find time for it. I am planning some videos soon and i will keep them in universal english language spoken by me but translated via subtitle to german. I guess this direction is way more easier to stay motivated for the translation work, but the jungle is busy, please be patient.

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Wade asks via email:

"hey jarhead,
Im a huge fan of your work and i often use your tutorials to try and improve my painting skills.

However I have had a hard time figuring out how to blend and what colors to use.  I am currently working on a white scar army and would appreciate any help you can give.
Blending-I understand pushing pigments however i can never get my models to come out the way i want them to.  How do i know where to start the glaze and how do i glaze objects smoothly (like a shoulder pad)
how do i glaze in such a small area? or a large surface?
I understand you are a busy man and i appreciate your time.

p.s. a white scar tutorial would be more than pleasurable"

My answer:

I would love to sit next to you for a couple of minutes as there is such a complex answer needed to answer your question - i would have an easy way to explain this to you. Finding words for it seems always like writing a book. As i had a painting class last weekend i can remember very good where the problems did occour. Maybe this helps you a bit. First, for painting small areas you don't need a small brush at all. I do mostly everything with a Windsor & Newton Series 7 (long version) Size 1. That is my main brush as it keeps the colour in it liquid for a long time because of its size and water saving capability. That means i can paint longer without having to refill the brush with colours. I do most time don't paint with the brush tip, i am using the side of the brush to draw glazes, this allows me to hit a far larger area than by only using the tip. It also means that i can have a better view on the model and the area i am painting because i can have a straighter look at it instead of having a brush end hit my eyes all the time. Using the brush side to paint (like described here) makes your areas cleaner.

"How do i know where to start the glaze and how do i glaze objects smoothly (like a shoulder pad)? "

It's all about using the brush side. Put your main colour in plac (the colour you want to have the area coloured in the end, like Ultramarines blue for a Ultramarine shoulder pad for exmaple), make sure your basecolour is not too dark, it works better if you work your way down to shadows then working from darkness to light. So in the example of the Ultrashoulderpad i would start with a tip of bleached bone in the Ultramarine colour for the basic colour. After this is dry i would get back to unmixed Ultramarine blue and mixing up a glaze by adding water. Main Problem now is very often, your brush keeps too much water, using my thumb skin helps me to get most of the liquid amount out of it by feeling it. Your thinned colour, the glaze will still be in there even if there is not much water in your brush. Less water provides working without having your water flowing all around. I now would go at the shoulder pad and set my first glaze. By using the theory of zenithal light situaion i know that the upper area of the shoulder pad will stay brighter than the rest so i won't start my glaze there. If you take the complete area of the shoulder pad as 100% space i would start my first glaze at ~75% of the area and pull it down with the side of my brush. Take care that you don't stay to long at the place where you start to pull down your glaze as if you do there might be colour pigments on both sides of the brush and pulling down brings the lower puddle away but there still stays a rest of the upper puddle and already you got the first unclean area. When pulling glazes of dark colour over an area i pull them down to bring the puddle in place where the shadow ends. Remember you can always do several glazes of the same colour to intense the effect, described here in the glazing article. Moving on to the next shadow i would put in a drop of darker blue into the Ultramarine blue. Again i would not glaze the comple pad, instead i take a look on the first shadow glaze i have done and now would take this as 100% area, starting the next glaze at ~75% of this area and pull it down again, maybe for several times to again intense the effect. The upper bright main colour is still visible like before. Next i would do another darker shadow tone, again taking a look at the latest painted shadow, 100% area, ~75%, pull it down and so on. It is you who chooses the maximum of contrast between bright and dark that you bring in at your place and the knowledge that upper parts of a model (for example torso) are still brighter than the lower ones (for example legs). After i have finished the dark glazes i go back to my basic colour and use the same technique for the lights, mixing the basic colour brighter and using the bright area i still got left as 100% area, 75% will now be glazed with the brigher tone by moving the side of the brush to the light. Simply keep in mind, glazing shadows means pulling down your glaze to the shadow area while glazing lights is in the opposite direction to the lights - put it where you want it :)

"how do i glaze in such a small area? or a large surface?"

This technique works on bigger areas the same as on smaller areas, using the side of the brush, if it is tiny microbrush like talked about in the introduction of this answer will provide you a different swiftness of your brush blade with the side of the tip for small areas and the massive side of the whole brush for larger areas. If your brush is too small or your model too big just use a bigger brush to have the same effect even on big time monster skin.



Main Problems that can appear to keep you from smooth glazing:

- Your glaze is too thin. Most time that is not a bad problem but you don't get a fast effect. It takes around 5~10 glazes to finally see the effect. Otherwise your glaze can be too thick and you will get an effect of just having paint there. I can't describe in words exactly what you got to do, try, explore and find out - if it helps, the consistency should be the same as milk.



- Your brush is too small and has no reservoir. You will not be able to reallý glaze areas as the colours dry out very fast in your brush and there is no reserve coming out of your brush while working.


- You have too much water in your brush left while glazing, that brings problems like it runs everywhere or you have puddles you don't want to have and brings drying water/colour spots to your area. In perfect case you pull your glaze and see it dry a very short moment afterwards in front of your eyes.


- You are scared or not concentrated. You are working too wildly and don't concentrate in the area you are working with. The first sketch of painting can be wildly but in glazing shadow and light it helps to concentrate only on one spot, 100% :)


- You don't give the glaze you've put on the time to dry out, so with your next glaze you rip of still wet areas and do unwanted and not so nice damage to your area.

- You get nervous when something happens and go wildly over places that have been already glazed and finished. Now panic occours and you work everywhere without thinking. That is the worst case, the horror scenario.

My tip would be that you try to do this step by step, maybe not at a complete model, you can use for example a shoulder pad and do this for several times as i described above. My note for me would be a video tutorial about that someday when i find the time. I hope i could have helped you answering your question, even this is way easier sitting next to you than finding words for a whole text.

"p.s. a white scar tutorial would be more than pleasurable"

I guess this has to wait a little longer, there are way too much Space Marine Chapters to start this that way. I can only say that i paint the things i like and sometimes i find the time to do an article about it. I got to plan this and planning and the effort needed for such a step by step always takes my minimum double time for the model. So i can't do that very often, sorry - but i'll try my best.

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Every Painting Jam comes to an end - here is the end of this one :)
You can find all the others in the Painting Jam Overview!

Keep on happy painting!
Best Regards
Roman

If you want to help with a cup of coffee do a