Filters, Who, What, How, Where & When?

[shanerozzell]

Hi All,
I Just read the post by Kalidane about wahes and the last post was Ritual\'s who mentions filters. I have seen this technique mentioned before and wondered about it. I have checked the articles and very little is mentioned there. Could someone explain them to me; why they are used and how to use them?
Many Thanks.

 

[Ritual]

Basically, from what I\'ve come to understand, a filter is something, applied in a thin, transparent \"film\" over a surface, with the purpose of shifting the underlying colour. A glaze is, therefore, a type of filter.

I use glazes extensively, to apply shadows and highlights over a base coat.

 

[shanerozzell]

Thanks Ritual for your timely reply.
So, as I understand it, filters can be used to simulate how light would reflect off a surface. For example a space marine shoulderpad would use light differently than a cloak. The cloak would absorb most of the light and the shoulderpad would reflect most of the light.

 

[Ritual]

I\'m not sure I understand what you mean exactly, but think of a filter as a very subtle way to change the appearance of a surface (or part of a surface). You can shift the hue by using different colours, but you can also shift value by using lighter or darker colours with your filters.

You can use filters to introduce colour variations, for instance to let the shadows shift slightly towards a different colour.

But, you can also use glazes, for instance, to actually slowly build your basic shadows and highlights. This is a slow process, but thanks to the subtle nature of the filter you will achieve very smooth transitions from dark to light. And, you can also easier create more interesting transitions where more than two colours are involved. Look at articles written by automaton, for instance. He uses this technique a lot.

As one layer of a filter hardly makes any visible effect at all (if applied thinly enough) it is easy to create seamless transitions by just covering slightly smaller areas for each layer. There will be no visible \"edges\".

 

[Farin]

I think Ritual explained it very well , but i want to add that a good example are Metal colours:

You can use blue glazes to give a silver armour a steel - like finish or you can make them look rusted by veeery slowly building up orange /brown shadows /areas. Other colours can give interesting effects or help you ninding them them to the other colours on you miniature

a very good example is Nanos Dreadnought

Dreadnought

the different tones and variations of metal you see here are made that way

 

[shanerozzell]

Thanks for the help you guys, I think I understand them much more now. I am just begining to use the glaze technique on some minitures so will post soon.

 

[Einion]

Originally posted by Ritual
A glaze is, therefore, a type of filter.

Filters are a type of glaze

The term filter was coined to describe something there was already a word for, so it\'s entirely redundant.

I knew I remembered an old thread on this, here.

Einion

 

[Ritual]

Originally posted by Einion
The term filter was coined to describe something there was already a word for, so it\'s entirely redundant.

Some historical painters I know had never heard of a glaze, but they used the term filter for pretty much the same thing. They\'re older than me, so I figured filter was a more general and widespread term.

Filter also describes a bit more the actual function and use of the technique (better than glaze does, at least).

 

[Farin]

@Ritual

Millitary Painters use the therm filter as well . here ´s a link

Ultrawerke



you have to scroll down to his weathering tutorial

Filters where developed by Miguel \"MIG\" Jimenez (if you don\'t know him, just make a quick search for his work, absolutely brilliant!!!!). They are like a kind of very subtle glazing done by oils or enamels.

or in our case acrylic colors, that have the advantage of not having to dry for hours

My guess is the therm \"glaze\" derives from classic aquarell/water color painting were glazes are the primary way of painting

 

[Einion]

Originally posted by Ritual
Some historical painters I know had never heard of a glaze, but they used the term filter for pretty much the same thing. They\'re older than me, so I figured filter was a more general and widespread term.

I can buy that, not that it makes filter any more acceptable IMB Glazing is so well entrenched in painting I can\'t understand not knowing it in all honesty, unless one developed in isolation; it has been around for centuries.

Originally posted by Ritual
Filter also describes a bit more the actual function and use of the technique (better than glaze does, at least).

A glaze does say what it does if one is introduced to the term properly, although maybe this is a subtlety of understanding with English as a first language? (Some people with little or no background in photography won\'t have the same understanding of filter either.)

The basic problem I have with this kind of thing is what\'s to stop anyone who develops a \'new\' technique (just some form of known painting methods) from coining an idiosyncratic term for it - because it makes it sound cool/revolutionary/better? Because they want it to be associated with them? Because it\'s new to them?

Before we know it we\'ve got dozens of new terms for stuff we already knew about, adding unnecessary confusion. It\'s not like painting techniques and terminology aren\'t already complex enough!

/soapbox

Einion

 

[Ritual]

FWIW, I use mostly the term glazing. I only use filter when I want to describe how the technique works, as I think the analogy with camera filters is pretty descriptive.

For me, when I hear the word glaze I think about rubbing stuff on a chicken before roasting it in the oven. lol