These are some of the heads I've painted lately - Pictures made with very strong morning sun light (so not the best for good results, but it shows well the defects, and also I now realise how full of dust some of them are 🫣).

I'm satisfied on how they look in general, but I'd like to improve a bit and maybe get more consistent results.

I try to paint them layering thin coats and building from dark to lighter tones as I've seen in some online tutorials. I don't usually use washes or contrast / speed paint except in some cases to apply a strong shading to the edges under the hair.

I usually find the following issues:

• Chalkiness, and undesired texture - I think this is down to thinning the paint the right amount, but I don't seem to get it right consistently and my results vary too much. Any tip on how to achieve better consistency?
• Painting eyes - I find it really challenging as I can't see them without a big magnifying glass. But I also have problems with the paint consistency, like the paint some times dries on the brush before it reaches the miniature. I'd like to know how people paint their eyes.

How do you paint faces? Anything obvious I can improve, or just keep practicing?

Hi all, I've done a bit of digging but general advice seems to be a bit all over the place.

It's getting into the colder time of year, and over the past few weeks my spray can primers seem to be suffering, and it seems an airbrush would fix this.

I'm a bit lost though. There seems to be so many opinions of where to start I figured I'd lay out a bit of a plan and go from there.

It would appear, that for a compressor I want something with a tank so it's not constantly on. Something like an as 186. Timber techs ABPST08 seems to be at least from an actual brand people have used and reasonably cheap.

As far as brushes go, lots of people saying straight down the iwata route. I've also seen quite a bit of support for some of the mid range ghaaleri brushes, but there also seems to be some very vocal opposition.

I have a cheap airbrush and compressor, a no name brush and little black box compressor combo thing, and I used it a bit years ago just to mess about with for school, but I think I want something semi capable for minis that I won't be constantly fighting against.

Is there a gold standard starter kit, is my plan solid, am I even along the right lines?

Any ideas or thoughts would be great. Id rather not be spending a lot quite early to the hobby.

two part issue

first it seems that a local gamestore that did have P3 paints is unable to get a restock.

second a number of Steamforged kickstarts and gamefound campaigns have gone into limbo and do not have support anymore. This includes their wave 2 of P3 paints

in addition there was a compulsory strike-off notice issued by the UK register of companies on September 1st. originally this was assumed to be a restructuring issue but they have multiple unfulfilled crowd sourced games that are over a year overdue.

is this line of paints discontinued?

Hey all!

So I’ve came back to this tutorial on black armour by companyofthebitteriron on IG. Before anyone asks yes I’ve messaged him, twice.

In his guide he starts, as more often than not, with a black prime. Ok easy. Tick that off the list.

It’s here I run into problem.

He says Zenithal with Tamiya NATO black. Well, his picture doesn’t look like NATO black on a black primed model. My NATO black is nowhere near as light as this Zenithal.

So my question is, what alternative would you use? Specifically to get close to the grey in this picture.

Cheers all!

Hello friends. I found STLs for a miniature that is a hommage to the singer of the band Sleep Token. The gimmick the band uses is all black bodypaint. I'm not great at painting skin in general, but I've never tried that kind of effect. Does anybody have a good recipe or tutorial for this?

Thank you.

I am in the process of setting up a battle map for my DnD players, which is going to require a lot of terrain pieces. The majority of them are OpenLock tiles, thankfully, but there will also be some additional rubble and the like.

I was wondering what the optimal way to get this done would be while still making it look like some effort was put into it. These are the possible options I have so far:

- 3D print everything in gray, prime it all black, and then do a lot of dry brushing.

- 3D print everything in a colored filament (perhaps something multicolor), apply a matte varnish, and then dry brush with some washes

Any other ideas or input on this?

Hi all

I'm planning to paint up some larger models* that I would like to use my air brush on as I am not a fan of doing such large models with a conventional brush and I want to challenge myself to use my airbrush more for these types of models.
To do these projects I will need to expand my collection of paints and I am after an up to date comparison between the Army Painter Air Paints and the Vallejo Air ones.

Currently I use vallejo paints for priming, zenithal highlighting (in white, ivory or grey) and doing single colour base coats. I haven't minded using these paints for this purpose as I get a good result from them, but having never used the Army painters range I'm curious to see how they compare. Another aspect I am curious about with the Army painter range is their colour triad system and how they label them up so that you know the order to apply them in which for someone who is looking to learn this is appealing to me.

So if you have experience in using both ranges of airbrush paints I would love to hear from you both the good and the bad for both ranges.

Thanks in Advance

*For context the size of models I am looking at doing are similar in size to the Tontor from Parabellum and the super heavy warbeasts or warmachines from Privateer press

This is a follow up to a previous post I made a while back about the cloak and how to shade it.

TLDR:
- Does the paint scheme feel uncanny?
- Does the cloak look like gradients or sketching?
- How do I tint metals?
- What are some dropper bottles for Retributor Armor and Screaming Bell color matches?

I just finished my Tech Priest Underseer for my Kill Team but more importantly he is my first attempt at the style I want to use for my Tech Priest characters throughout my army. The idea I have is to make them stand out from the rest of the infantry by making them look ever so slightly off when compared to the regular Skitarii or Servitors.

The sculpts already lend themselves to that idea but I wanted the paint scheme to try to bring that out a bit more. I tried to exaggerate the shadows on the cloak and use a darker steel color than the rest of my army. Not sure if I went far enough when compared to the unit this model is going to be a part of so any help would be appreciated. I don’t think that the pictures are going to do me any favors with the front facing light so the paint scheme needs to make up for the lack of natural shadows.

Something else I need help with is the gradients. Since my last post, I’ve bought a wet palette and some different reds since I could not get the Citadel ones to blend. I tried wet blending on the cloak but I’m not sure how well it came out since I was fighting it a bunch with the grey bottom blending into a preexisting lighting gradient. Mainly just need another set of eyes to see if I stuck the landing or not.

I had a thought of trying to make the steel look likes it’s tinted blue to contrast against all of the warm colors going on in my other models but I have no idea where to start on that.

Also, I’m trying to move away from Citadel pots since I keep having them dry out on me. I haven’t been able to find a good match for Retributor Armor and Screaming Bell so I was hoping to get pointed in the right direction for a dropper bottle. I’ve tried Vallejo TMM line but nothing has either yet.

Thank you for your time

I've been kind of stuck in a rut recently, painting sub-par model after model. I think what frustrates me most is the money I pour into it to get results I find subpar. For example, I'm tackling a diorama with these smaller 28mm animals, and they look like someone just squirted paint on them and they have little to no depth; they are fairly flat-surfaced as well, with some detail but not a lot. I've reprimed and tried again, just to still be annoyed. What things do y'all do to try and break outta the funk or come up with new tactics?

Hi all,

I'm not a total novice, but I'm relatively new to airbrushing, and looking for some help.

Midway through my recent airbrushing session, my brush stopped working properly, in what I assumed was a normal paint clog.

It wasn't quickly resolved with a quick targeted needle clean, so I stripped and cleaned the entire airbrush and now, nothing other than air exits the front of the brush.

I've gone in with cotton buds, a needle/nozzle cleaner, & interdental brushes, and everything looks clean and good to go, but when I assemble the brush back together, it just... doesn't let anything from the cup out. I'm just trying with water at this point, to figure it out.

It still lets air through, and when I block the nozzle and pull the trigger the cup gets normal backflow. The only thing giving me pause is that there's minor backflow even when I don't pull the trigger (i.e. just depress and let air pass through).
I admit I don't know enough to know whether that's normal or indicating something else.

I've tried tightening everything, and checked the seal on the nozzle, and all looks fine, and I feel like I'm at a dead end.

I'm using the H&S Evolution CR Plus.

Any ideas?!

Thanks in advance.

Hi people !

I’m struggling with my first OSL… i don’t have any airbrush and I’m trying to get it working on a small mini from the witcher old world.

The light should come from his inner body.

Please help me understand how should I have done !

I am trying to push my painting skills for my first ever DnD miniature. He is feeling a bit bland to me right now. I would really appreciate some advice on highlights or stylistic changes to make him feel more mythic!

Tested my hand on some nighttime osl, and would like some help, the rest isnt finished, so please judt the headlights😅😅

Hello! I used to play Warhammer several years ago, but I wasn't much into painting. Now I'm trying to become a better painter. I'm painting Necron Lychguards with a blue color scheme. I am trying to paint the recessed lines on the shields with a bright blue color. I used Vallejo white ink first, then Vallejo fluo blue. But it's a mess every time (see first picture), and I spent a lot of time fixing it for mixed results... (second picture).

I tried it with different levels of dilution and different paintbrushes. Am I doing it the wrong way, or am I just not good enough with my brush yet.

Wanted a base for a xenos character, so no better choice than a deceased Deathwatch marine. Poor lad

Had fun painting this swarmlord after a halloween crab in its colors

Hi there! I recently finished the first kitbashing with a sister of battle (homebrew) Hope you like it, constructive criticism is totally welcome!

I normally paint my Space Marines as Blood Angels but I have had a go at an Ultra Marine for a painting competition at my local gaming store. I'm pretty pleased with how this turned out.

My latest hobby project 😁

Not everyone’s favourite sculpt I know, but a great excuse to use the new Vallejo metallics.

Theme of comp was eldritch horror, found this mini of nylarthotep and thought it would be perfect. Spent probably 20-30 hours on it, speedpaints, regular, airbrushing, every technique i know and some I experimented with for the first time. Winning mini was more of a diorama than a singular mini (allowed in the rules of the competition, that's another topic entirely though), so looking for any ways I can improve for the next one!

EDIT: Thanks everyone for the feedback! It's been great to get great constructive criticism. Unfortunately I've got to get actual work done (gotta pay the bills after all) so I've got to wait to reply to any one else!

A small crew of 3 slightly converted new Ogors! Might paint more in the future

Almost done!