From painting 1/6 scale to Mini best way to start

[dark-assassin]

I have been painting large 1/6 scale resin and vinyl model kits for years now.
The thing is i have been painting mini's the same way and they just don't look right.
I really like the way mini's are painted with the hight light's painted.
I have also painted a good few of the forgeworld large scale items.
Here are a few pics to show you what i mean

here are 1/6 scale figures

and some mini's

Any help would be greatly appreciated , or if anybody lives close to Liverpool UK
and would be willing to talk it over , even better.

cheers

Jay

 

[freakinacage]

i'd say you have to increase your contrast, as a general rule, the smaller the scale, the hight the contrast needs to be in order to make it pop

 

[sivousplay]

I agree w/ what freak said completely ... you've really got to "pump up the volume" on contrast for minis to pop ... if you think about it, you've got all these tiny little edges that somehow have to find their way to your eyeball or the camera sensor ... pick something like say a shoelace ... on a 1/6 scale kit a shoe is somewhere around 1 inch x 1/3 inch and on a 30mm scale mini its probably 1/4 inch x 1/12 inch. So, the shoelaces are these criss-crossy lines on a 1/3 sq in area or on a 1/48 sq in area (so the area of the shoe is 16 times smaller on the mini) if that detail that is 16 times smaller needs to show up "vibrantly" on your picture, you're going to have to make it a lot (I'd assert something approaching 16 times) more contrasty to make it noticeable.

On a large scale kit you may be able to get away w/ painting a lace light brown and still having it show up nicely against a dark brown shoe ... on a mini against that same dark brown shoe, you probably have to paint your lace something approaching ivory to get it to show up as obviously ... this may be over-stated a bit, but I think you get the idea.

I hope this helps.
jim

 

[Einion]

If you hadn't already done any minis I would have recommended doing at least a couple of things at an intermediary scale, working down to mini sizes.

Anyway, I think higher contrast and focus on the edges are the main things to concentrate on (common advice for painting minis anyway). Also, this is partly a style thing but more attention paid to light direction could be good - upward-facing surfaces are lighter, vertical surfaces are medium values and downward-facing planes are dark... horizontals that face the ground being done in black, or nearly so, wouldn't be uncommon in mini painting.

Einion

 

[Dragonsreach]

As Einion and Freak have said increased contrast is primary to the size for the effect.
With the 1/6th stuff I see you've done, the room for subtle colour changes in the paintwork is far more accessible, with 28mm not so.

Consider this that a 1/6th mini would have the visual distance equivalent of someone roughly 20 feet away (in good light) a 28mm figure (1/56th -ish) closer to 100 feet.
In order to get the same visual impact the colours need to be brighter and more eyecatching via the use of higher contrast.
Having said that, the colours should still be smoothly shifted between their darkest value and the highest values and not just Black, Blue, White for example.

I work in Birkenhead so for me, taking a long lunch break over to pop over to Liverpool isn't out of the question.

 

[dark-assassin]

Thanks for the advice everyone.
Dragonsreach , yeah that would be great to take up your lunch break for me.

Thanks ever so much

Jay

 

[Hoodoo_Hermit]

I just wanted to say that I think your 1/6th scale work is lovely, especially the orc and I imagine that once these pros get your miniature technique refined that you'll be cranking out some real quality work. I look forward to seeing it

 

[dark-assassin]

I just wanted to say that I think your 1/6th scale work is lovely, especially the orc and I imagine that once these pros get your miniature technique refined that you'll be cranking out some real quality work. I look forward to seeing it

Thanks a lot buddy , shame i sold it though.

Thanks again

Jay

 

[jcichon]

Up until a few months ago I painted 90mm and larger for years and got the bug to try a mini and have been hooked ever since. I always painted with oils so learning acrylics AND working in much smaller scale gave me a lot to learn. I will echo what everyone else has said that contrast contrast contrast is the key. If you think the highlight isnt high enough then double that and your on the right track! I have also learned the value of washes which was something I had never used before. I think one of the positives coming from large scale oil work is we have a good understanding of brush control and color blending/theroy. Not saying strict mini painters dont have because they do, my point being we have at least gotten our feet wet doing large scale which helps to translate into sound fundamentals in painting all around. But one thing doesnt change in either the historical and mini wargaming painting, there are a few way too serious painters! I had a guy complain about the wrong style strap on a WWII 120mm figure I had done and how it was all wrong and on my second warhammer mini I had a guy complain about the color of his loin cloth which I wanted to reply to ask how many live space marine librarians he had met. Wow, that was long winded!