40K: Fine felt pens in place of freehand, any suggestions?

Levdir

New member
Hey all, this here be my first forum post on CMON. Down to business: I suck at freehand. So I\'m thinking that I\'d like to give fine-line felt pens a try. Anyone have a preferred brand or model? How easy are they to paint over if I mess up? And can I get them in white? My soon-to-be Space Marine chapter uses a black-and-white colour scheme, and I\'ll want to have bits of scripture and whatnot on the black areas of the armour. Thanks in advance for any help you can give me!
 
1st off welcome to the forums.

I use micron pens. I personally have the 005 black pen. I have not done much freehand with them but I do use them to dot my eyes.

If you are in the states you should be able to pick them up at Micheals, Joe-Anns or an office supply store. Over seas I am not sure.

They do come in a variety of colors but I do not believe white is one of them.

I hope this may help.
 
E

E-Arkham

Guest
Welcome to the forums and all that!

I\'ll second the recommendation for Micron pens, but I wouldn\'t recommend using them for everything. Unless you leave them to dry overnight, they have a tendency to be easily smeared by wet brushes or fingers. Honestly, a good Winsor and Newton brush will let you get finer lines with better control. However, they\'re quite good for dotting eyes, blacklining, signing the bottoms of bases, or marking out freehand designs for painting over.

I also have used Le Plume pens, available at Micheals, etc. Mostly I use these for subtle object source effects. They\'re very smooth, but don\'t quite compare to a brush IMO. I toyed with the idea of painting an entire figure with them, but it\'d really be too hard to get in the crevices for it to be feasible.

Kep
 

Equus

New member
The motion to welcome Levdir and recommend Micron pens has been moved and seconded. I\'ll throw my vote in for both. :D

Microns do take a while to dry, and they also tend to stain pretty well, so watch out when using them. Like E-Arkham mentions, wet brushes, paint, or your fingers will smuge it pretty easily for quite a long time, depending on how much ink you put on the surface. Not sure how many eyes and things I\'ve ruined that way.

I think I\'ve mentioned it before, but I\'ve used oil paints on some of my larger scale models and have wondered about using it for freehand painting on my minis. The downside is it takes forever to dry. The upside is it takes forever to dry. :p The stuff I use to thin or erase also won\'t attack the acrylics, so if I really mess it up, I can erase it. I\'ve used it mostly for eyes on anime models and some blending. Not sure if I\'d recommend it for anyone though, because of the long cure times and the cost to start up is a little prohibitive for decent/good paints.

...and on a totally random off-topic note, this makes my 100th post. Maybe I should concentrate on work a little more. lol
 

Levdir

New member
Thanks for the suggestions, everyone. I live in Canada and we have a Michael\'s in my city, so I\'ll check out the Micron pens. The main thing I\'d use them for right now is painting squad/rank markings on my Tau. Thanks again.
 

Shawn R. L.

New member
I have been thinking of trying the same thing. Sharpie makes some fine tipped felt pens. There is also a drafting pen called a \'rapidiograph\' by...... Osmoroid? A good art store will have rapidiographs. They come in many size tips, way down to 00.
 
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