Help with washes!

[Bludgut]

Hello CmoN community, I\'m hoping you can help me with getting started with washes.

First off, I started painting only a few days before Christmas, as thats when my GW Deluxe starter set arrived (£80 off ebay), a few days after that my paints arrived too. (130 or so Citadel paints/washes/glazes, old/new/some unopened, a bargain I think at £68 inc delivery! I\'m also incredibly proud of my Go Fasta Red, which I\'m gonna save for some character!))

To kick things off for this thread, here\'s the range of washes (and glazes) I recieved in this multitude of paints:

My questions are this:
1) Will I have to thin, or do anything else with these Citadel Colour washes? If so, what would be the best solution to use for these particular ones? (I\'m mostly thinking of washing skins, and the skull atop the banner, it\'s currently straight bleached bone over black undercoat.)

2) A quick mini tut on washing would be extremely helpful, I\'ve read and gooogle as much I can, but aside from someone writing \"apply the wash\", the articles I\'ve read dont go into detail on how, do I cover the whole to-be-washed area in the stuff?

And to finish, a quick pic of my first few (WIP!) Gobbos from BFSP!

click HERE for a 1024x768 pic.

Aside from getting a better camera, am I doing ok from what you guys can make out?

[added] A bit of messing with lighting/positioning gave a better result (only just!)

bigger pic
Thanks for any help guys!

 

[Valander]

Welcome to the painting hobby!

Washing is easily one of the more important techniques you can learn, so it\'s important to take some time and play with it.

Generally speaking, most \"washes\" or \"glazes\" that you can buy tend to be a bit too thick for use right out of the bottle. You should probably thin them down a bit more. You can use just water, but often you\'ll get \"tide marks,\" where the wash/ink/glaze will leave little rings or lines, rather than having a smooth finish. To help with this, you can use only distilled water (should be able to find at the grocery store for like a buck or so per gallon), or use any number of additives--\"Magic Wash\" (a mix of 25% Future Floor Finish and distilled water), some matte medium (usually can find this at art or hobby stores), or even a tiny drop of dishwashing liquid soap. All of these basically help break the surface tension on the inks, helping to avoid \"tide marks.\"

As for applying them, it might help to have a bit of newspaper around. You can tell you\'ve got a decent consistency when you can brush a little over some newsprint and still see the print underneath. Once you\'ve got the consistency, the usual method is to apply the wash to whatever area you\'re working on--covering the whole \"to be washed\" area is typically fine. After it dries, you can either add another wash or start layering or drybrushing or whatever host of other techniques you want to use.

Also, it\'s better to apply a couple of thinner washes until you get the color tone you want, rather than having a wash that\'s too thick. It\'s easier to apply more washes than selectively take some off.

Hope this helps!

 

[DaRat]

Originally posted by Bludgut
First off, I started painting only a few days before Christmas, as thats when my GW Deluxe starter set arrived (£80 off ebay), a few days after that my paints arrived too. (130 or so Citadel paints/washes/glazes, old/new/some unopened,)

Looks like some fairly old paint, judging from the bottles. If they are well sealed, shouldn\'t be a problem.

1) Will I have to thin, or do anything else with these Citadel Colour washes? If so, what would be the best solution to use for these particular ones? (I\'m mostly thinking of washing skins, and the skull atop the banner, it\'s currently straight bleached bone over black undercoat.)

Yes, you probably will want to thin the out of the bottle washes. I\'ve not used those washes, so I don\'t know how much you will need to thin them, but you should probably just start with water.

You can also use matte medium (in addition to water), which is used for thinning acrylic paints. You can find matte medium at an arts supply house. You also might want to use a bit of flow aid.

I use a mixture of distilled water, flow improver, and a drying retarder at a (5:4:1 ratio, after diluting per instructions) to dilute my paints and washes.

2) A quick mini tut on washing would be extremely helpful, I\'ve read and gooogle as much I can, but aside from someone writing \"apply the wash\", the articles I\'ve read dont go into detail on how, do I cover the whole to-be-washed area in the stuff?

There are different techniques to applying washes.

The most basic is just to slop the wash on fairly liberally so that the wash collects in recesses and such. You can apply the wash in a controlled fashion (only to certain areas) o in a more liberal fashion (to the entire figure). In both cases, just paint the wash on, but you\'ll let the wash collect/pool in recesses .

A more controlled wash is sometimes called a glaze. A glaze is often used to shift colors or unify layers. In this case, the wash is carefully applied only to specific areas and only so that a thin layer is applied. Here, you won\'t want the wash to collect/pool.

And to finish, a quick pic of my first few (WIP!) Gobbos from BFSP!

The Gobbos look good, at least to the limits of the photos!

 

[Bludgut]

Thanks for the tips guys I\'m gonna have to sort myself out with a test dummy and give these washes a whirl I think!

Yup, some of these paints are old as hell, but I\'ve opened each and every one (that wasn\'t sealed) stirred them with a cocktail stick and added a drop or more of water to those that were really thick. Only 4 of the 136 that arrived were either fully dry, or almost empty. This turned out to not be such a bad thing, as I mixed myself 1/2 a pot of Bubonic Brown from an article on CmoN!

I have loads of OOP paints, at first I though they were just old names and have been changed since, but I like this collection of rare stuff. Dunno if I\'ll ever find a way to use that Metallic Blue though, and Smelly Primer gets the award for wierdest named

Happy New Year!

 

[JesterzUSMC]

That smelly primer is GOLD!!
It thins with water but I\'d suggest a drop of dish soap, but it make a BEAUTIFUL and usually EVEN primer coat.

 

[rextalon]

Not that I\'ve used a lot of them, but I\'d also like to add what I\'ve gathered concerning the difference between inks and glazes...

Washes are for making the cracks shaded a certain color. Also, the color you think would be best may not be optimum. Try out different colors on test models to find the best one. For instance, green wash may be worse/better than blue for orks.

Inks (glazes) are for changing the hue of an entire area. For instance, a grey tile wall may look dirty if you fill in the cracks with a wash. It will look even dirtier if you were to glaze the tiles with a tan or green color, or both! A popular glaze combo is blue and violet over white or silver base. It makes a nice contrast for things like Dark Elf weapons or Grey Knight armor, depending upon value (brightness). Again, testing different methods is best.

And there are GREAT articles out there for inking!

 

[Legacy Account]

You can wash or glaze with ink or paint (or the pots named Glazes...), it doesn\'t matter. The inks will dry with a slight sheen. The glazes usually have a more matt finish - more like a paint/ink mix.

Just water them down slightly, you don\'t need to start adding other tat to the mix.