Starter Paint Selection and Tutorials...?

[Nessin]

Two question I\'m hoping someone can help me with:

1) Is there anywhere I can find a single document for all that is painting? I\'ve found tons of articles (here and elsewhere) for how to do one thing, but I\'d like ot have a document that explains how to paint starting at a beginners level going to at least good quality table-top level. I did have the Games Workshop/Citadel painting guide, but I left it on a plane accidentally, so I\'d prefer to avoid buying something.

Plus I know it\'s not too much trouble to scout around for individual articles, but I\'ve found two problems with that. For one, some things just aren\'t explained. Examples, I\'ve looked everywhere, and I\'m sure the answer is right under my nose, but no where does anyone explain just what in the hell a \"wash\" is. From piecing together forum conversations and implications in articles, I\'m sure it means painting a very thin watered down coat on so paint gets deep into the folds, but I\'m not 100% sure on that. For two, looking at individual articles brings up a lot of redundant comments, and one person does something one way, which contradicts how another person says to do it, so on and so forth...

2) I\'m building my collection of paints (Vallejo Game Color) for painting a Protectorate Warmachine Army, and I\'ve identified what paints I\'m going to get for my color theme, but I need some help with what colors I should get that fall into the category \"You should always have\". I figure I\'d need at least a white, black, and a strong color from the each of the major wheel spokes (Blue, Green, Red, etc...) but anything else?

P.S. I\'d buy a complete set, but my budget at the moment only allows for 30-35 colors. The rest is eaten up by all the other useless junk I need.... like brushes.

 

[Ritual]

I was going to suggest the GW painting guid since that is the only resource I know of, that properly covers the basics in one place.

What colours you\'ll need depends on what type of painting you do. I like to paint with earth-like colours, browns, greens, greys and such. Therefore, my collection of paint contains a riddiculous amount of brown and grey nuances. What anybody needs, though, is a couple of browns (scorched brown or similar is very useful), a couple of greys, at least two shades of skin colour, perhaps three shades each of red, blue and green, bleached bone or similar, black and white of course, yellow, purple and metallics if you\'re going to use those. That\'s what springs to mind anyway...

 

[tidoco2222]

Have look here. The foundry system is acrylic and can be bought in packs that contain base, shade and highlight colour so in theory you can get good looking three dimensional paintschemes without too much mixing.
I found it s a great way to get paint and as you get more confident with colours and experimenting then there is no end to the results you can achieve.

http://www.wargamesfoundry.com/paint/index.asp

 

[Nessin]

Originally posted by tidoco2222
Have look here. The foundry system is acrylic and can be bought in packs that contain base, shade and highlight colour so in theory you can get good looking three dimensional paintschemes without too much mixing.
I found it s a great way to get paint and as you get more confident with colours and experimenting then there is no end to the results you can achieve.

http://www.wargamesfoundry.com/paint/index.asp

Well, I want to go Vallejo because it\'s much easier to mix paints with their bottles (and I\'m too lazy to transfer paint into similar bottles if I buy other brnads) and other than Citadel paints, it\'s the only kind I can get from my local gaming stores. So if I ever need something ASAP, or just need a small batch which isn\'t worth buying online, I can go get some paint locally.

Plus there is a guy that teaches a painting class at one of the local game stores, and he uses Vallejo game color, so it\'s easier to work with him on colors using VGC or Citadel paints.

 

[spike_92]

thers a good beiginner article on www.games-workshop.com its pretty good. i think u\'ll be able to find it

 

[frenchkid]

A good site for all level painting articles is the painting clinic. I use to haunt this site befor I found CMON and still go to check out the new articles every so often. There are ton of good articles there.
Otherwise I\'d sugest you stop worrying about articles and technique and all that, you can\'t learn to rockclimb or swim by just reading about it you have to practice and same goes for painting. Painting is the key to improving and in time you will find that they are technique tyou prefer to others. That is the reason there are so many different technique in articles.

 

[Nessin]

Originally posted by frenchkid
A good site for all level painting articles is the painting clinic. I use to haunt this site befor I found CMON and still go to check out the new articles every so often. There are ton of good articles there.
Otherwise I\'d sugest you stop worrying about articles and technique and all that, you can\'t learn to rockclimb or swim by just reading about it you have to practice and same goes for painting. Painting is the key to improving and in time you will find that they are technique tyou prefer to others. That is the reason there are so many different technique in articles.

I know, and I plan on doing just that. Actually other than getting my paints ordered, and finding someway to mount unattached parts for a handhold (since I\'m not painting my figures when they are assembled, that way when I screw up I don\'t have to strip the whole model), I\'m going to just \"dive right in\".

However, what I really want, is a document that I can reference for questions. Examples, I start painting a face, but just can\'t figure out how to get the eyes right, so I\'d like something I can goto quickly and look up a good way to do eyes. Or, like I mentioned above, I still don\'t have a clear idea of what a \"wash\" is, so I\'d like something I could look to for answers to those questions.

Yeah, I can always go back to sites like the Painting Clinic, or here, but I\'ve got to filter through whats there, look through at least 3 different opinions on the subject, and then filter through all the opinions for one that works in my situation because most online articles go into too much detail based on the subject (model) or don\'t cover the material I have questions about on a conceptual level.

 

[Badkarma1354]

You should check out the Reaper Pro Paint starter sets. They come with a good selection of paints, a guide, 2 brushes, and 2 figs. I heard good things about them when I was looking for a kit and I have been only pleased with the kit and Reaper.