Paint issues

[Frogjimjaff]

Hi I'm new to this painting lark and just started my first few minis.. I'm having issues when watering down white for highlights. The paint doesn't seem to flow it's seems to very bitty. Flecks of white and doesnt leave the brush nicely. Any ideas what I'm doing wrong? It's a games workshop white. I'm adding water and it's kinda see through when I paint it one my nail but looks yuck!

Its like it prefers to stay on the brush rather than the mini. If I add more water then it's a mess. I wipe it of on paper towel and the same thing happens
Any help would be amazing..
Thanks

 

[Ritual]

Sounds like too much water to me. Also, are you applying pure white as highlights? Even with the right paint consistency, that could easily end up giving you a rather chalky result and also a bit pale and lifeless. Try mixing the base coat, or whatever colour you have where you want to apply the highlights, with a bit of white or some other really light colour and apply highlights in steps. You can always add more white and apply new layers if you want to increase the effect.

 

[Frogjimjaff]

Thank you I will try with less water. I'm using white as i,m trying to paint a exhaust pipe on a bike kinda using nmm. Ive highlighted it up to the point where I wanted a strong white highlight to make it look shiny. It looked ok from a distance about ten miles:brushwave: away. But when I took a pic the paint was a bit thick so I started to water it down more to try get a nice white highlight. But then the paint seemed to break up into flecks. Which I guess means too much water. Thanks I will try less water on the exhaust on the other side of the bike. Shd I be using flow medium or water good enough for now?

I've added a picture below. I wanted to add a nmm look then add purples blues yellow glazes to show heat etc. You can see where when I added white it's turned into a mess and didn't blend or flow nice.

View attachment 67539

 

[Ritual]

Flow medium or glaze medium could be something to check out, yes. I use glaze medium from Vallejo quite frequently. Also, make sure you don't apply too much paint at once. Balancing the dilution of the paint with the thickness of your layers is tricky, but once you get the hang of it it will be like second nature.

Also, there is a paint in Vallejo's Model Color range called White Glaze. It pretty much does what the title suggests, straight out of the pot (but can be thinned down further, of course). I quite like it for situations like yours, when I want those extreme white reflections.

 

[Frogjimjaff]

Great thank you for the advice