Quickie about white

[mattrock]

Hey guys!

I\'m rather new to the message boards but I\'ve learned a ton from the site itself and many of the artists whose work is featured on it. I\'ve only been painting for a short time, but I feel like I\'m doing quite well with thanks in no small part to the information I\'ve found here.

I need some advice though. I\'ve been searching the forums and I haven\'t run across the exact problem I\'m having. I\'ve painted pure white on several minis but always in small areas. I don\'t have trouble with white looking white (ie, the shading and highlighting are going alright for me) but now that I\'m painting white on a larger area (namely the caparison of a Bret pegasus) I\'m noticing that It\'s coming off rather chalky looking. My paint is thin and I must have applied 20-30 layers at this point, but I\'m just not getting that nice, even coating that I get with other colors.

Any tips? ???

 

[DaN]

Tippex lol

EDIT: joking aside, white is a huge pain of a colour to get right IMO, even on smaller areas... I would just try and ensure you get the basecoat as smooth and light as possible...

(I tend to use Bleached bone for warmer whites and space wolf grey for colder whites)

 

[mattrock]

yeah...

Yeah...I finally got nervous and went over the whole thing with astronomican grey (which is very close to SW grey in color). The coat came out very smooth and even. I suppose I\'ll just highlight up to pure white from astro grey, but I\'d like to know what I might have done wrong to get the chalky texture. I know white can be dififcult. I keep thinking it would have evened out with more layers and coats, but I didn\'t want to risk a bumpy texture with too much.

 

[DaN]

I presume you were using GW white...?
TBH, GW white and yellow never seems to have a great consistency IMO

Along with a few other in the range.
I have now started to use P3 paints for anything where I want a smooth yellow or white finish.

 

[mattrock]

hmmm...

it was indeed skull white. I don\'t have any P3 paints, but I do have a large number of VMC paints including all of their 35 or so shades of white. Better options there you think?

I\'ve always heard good things about the coverage of GW skull white. I hadn\'t used the VMC on this piece as it will likely see table time and VMC tends to be fairly fragile in that regard.

 

[Undave]

GW are meant to be bringing out some \"one coat\" foundation white in the near future. While the one coat claim might be a bit far fetched, the other foundation paints have been quite good so far so Im looking forward to it.

 

[mattrock]

oh yeah?

That\'d be great. Sheesh, if it covered in 4 coats I\'d be happy. I love the foundation paints as undercoats and they really do have a great coverage aspect. Hence the use of astro grey.

You know where I can find some more information about this rumored white or is it just word of mouth at this point?

 

[Undave]

It\'s deffinately coming but I\'m not sure quite when. After christmas probably.

 

[Fizl]

Try buying a tube of artist acrylics - titanium white. Never had chalky white from that (although i bet some-one will come along and say they do).

I also sometimes thin white paint with white ink (FW make it)

Shaz

 

[Roger Bunting]

Artist\'s acrylics will work out cheeper, too. Of course, I don\'t know if they\'d be chalky or not as I tend to use them quite thick for my 2D stuff.

 

[mattrock]

Thanks for the feedback guys. I\'d still love to know what causes the chalkiness in the first place if anyone knows.

Is the paint too thick? thin? is it just the paint itself? Do I need to just suck it up and put another 400 or so thin layers to even it out?

 

[mattsterbenz]

I found that I used to get the chalky stuff sometimes even when I painted many thin layers, but I discovered that unless you let each layer of white dry completely before applying the next, it will pick up some of the previous layer. This happens with every other color, but white seems to be the nastiest.

I use GW white and haven\'t had a problem with it after I started taking a little more time with each layer.

-Matt

 

[mattrock]

Huh. That\'s a definite possibility. I\'ll slow it down and see if that works out. Thanks for the feedback.:idea:

 

[Beelzebrush]

If you make any colour of paint too watery, the pigment separates from the binder. When this happens, the water then evaporates leaving just the pigment and it dries chalky. Get some artist\'s matt medium or glaze medium and add some before watering the paint down. Alternatively, add a drop of detergent, it\'ll have the same effect.

Oh and white is a pain to paint flat.