Expert "tricks" to get better results??

[Ilelee]

I'm interested to hear from expert painters any good tricks they use to get cool and good results. I have heard quite a lot of "rumors" of different tricks the very best painters use. For example I heard that most of the painters at GW drill holes to the cover of their paints (I have no idea what this would achive), I don't know if this is true or not.

Basicly how do you exactly achive smooth highlights, shadows etc. What is the process and technique for you? Basicly what I do is paint the basic colour, then darker wash if needed (I usually water the wash down a bit) then start the highlighing and when it is done I once pain the area with very watered down base color to trying to smooth the highlight (I think this is called glazing by GW terms). This gives me okay results, but I'm not exactly satisfied yet (especially when I examine the minis in very good light from close). One of the problems I have found is if I do very sharp hightlights the figure looks very good from afar, but horrible from close and if I get a smooth highlight it's the other way around. I'm currently somewhere in the middle... so the figure doesn't look good from close or from far away .

Some questions:

-while highlighting do you let the previous highlight layer dry before painting the next one or do you try to hightlight while the previous is still wet? How watered down paints do you use?

-how much you time you use for the highlighing and do you use "glazing" technique to smoothen the highlights?

-what kind of brushed do you use? (material, manufacturer etc.?)

-paints are probably vallejo for most of the expers?

-I use spesial stuff (can't remember what it was) to water down my paints (and prevent them from drying as fast). Do you? The problem I found using it is that it really sometimes suck because the paint takes a bit longer to dry out, on the other hand it's great especially with the vallejo paints.

-blacklining, how do you do it if at all? Using washes/inks or what?

-drybrushing? I have kinda give up on this techique exept on armours and occasional sand-effect. I don't know, I never ever seem to get anything but dirty effects while using it. Is there any good tips of technique how to do it well (how to dry the brush/paint, what kind of brushes should be used to get best result etc.?)

-what do use use from mixing/blending paints? Do you really use diffrent brush than the one use use to paint the miniture like some painting tutorials teach? I find my paints dry before I am finished if I try to do that.

-anything else?

Thanks for all the input in advance!

[MickeX]

I'm all ears for those tricks... especially about blacklining. What kind of pen am I supposed to look for in the store?

[claymore]

Here's a link that should answer most of your questions concerning highlighting and blending. Keep in mind that the paints in this article are Vallejo model colors and not Vallejo game colors. The game colors contain less pigment then the model colors, so the dilution rates are different.

Brushes : Winsor & Newton serie 7, expensive but good

Never use the same brush for mixing and for painting, you probably won't with expensive W&N brushes.

[Melifaxis]

Great link, thank you!

[BunnyPuncher]

Despite years of searching, i've never found any good tricks...

Just tons of techniques that take an immense amount of practice to perfect...

I'm a noob painter so I'm in the same curve you here - struggling to get better...

[Kernspalt]

Ok, let's try to answer this as good as I can. I don't consider myself an expert, but this is what I do:

-while highlighting do you let the previous highlight layer dry before painting the next one or do you try to hightlight while the previous is still wet? How watered down paints do you use?

I let the paint dry for a short time, so that I don't rip off flakes when I do the next layer, but I dn't take the time to wait until the paint is thoroughly dry. I don't do wet-in-wet at all. I recently started watering my paints down quite a lot when doiung everything but the first base coat, about 50:50 until they are completely liquid, since this gives a lot smoother highlights. I only use water for thinning.

-how much you time you use for the highlighing and do you use "glazing" technique to smoothen the highlights?

Depends on the miniature, but most of the time goes to highlighting. I only use glazing when I find my highlights get too harsh, which is most of the time.

-what kind of brushed do you use? (material, manufacturer etc.?)

Pelican red sable, but I plan to change to DaVinci Kolinski the next time I buy brushes.

-paints are probably vallejo for most of the experts?

I usually buy Vallejo now, but I use them along with my older GW paints, and mix them freely.

-blacklining, how do you do it if at all? Using washes/inks or what?

I undercoat in black, so I get an automatic blacklining when I work carefully. I can definately recommend doing blacklining since this give the mini a much cleaner look, either with watered down black or a dark version of the color you used. Don't blackline white with black, but with grey.

-drybrushing? I have kinda give up on this techique exept on armours and occasional sand-effect. I don't know, I never ever seem to get anything but dirty effects while using it. Is there any good tips of technique how to do it well (how to dry the brush/paint, what kind of brushes should be used to get best result etc.?)

I use it for metallics and basing only, the best results in my opinion are with paint:water abour 4:1, a larger, good, fairly dry brush (I use size 2) and very little paint on the brush. Dip the brush, wipe it dry, dip it again, wipe it almost completly dry, and drybrush.

-what do use use from mixing/blending paints? Do you really use diffrent brush than the one use use to paint the miniture like some painting tutorials teach? I find my paints dry before I am finished if I try to do that.

I use a larger brush (size 3), but you can also use things like a toothpick for blending, and I often enough use my painting brush as well, especially for small amounts. If your paint dries too fast, you are probably using not enough water, in my opinion one of the main advantages of using a size 3 brush is that it holds enough water.

-anything else?

I don't like the results you get when using inks for darkening shadows, the result often looks kind of dirty. But in my opinion, washes and inks are great for:
-Addings hues of slightly different colors, like greenish and purple shadows on zombie flesh.
-Doing metals, especially gold, bronze, and rusty steel. For example, for bronze I use a mixture of Vallejo MC Brass and Vallejo MC Old Gold on black undercoat, generously ink twice with old GW Chestnut Wash, once with old GW Flesh Wash with some Goblin Green, and highlight with Vallejo Old Gold.