Watering down paint

[chaos877]

I\'ve been painting for round about a year now, and have gone from straight out of the pot, one coat, no highlights, to watering down, and highlighting at least 4-5 leyers. I generally only water down 20-30% water, the rest paint. I hear of people talking of watering down to 70-80% water. I have taught myself most of the tricks in my book, but I just cant get highlighting with uber watered down paint. Every time I try, the paint flows into cracks (I\'m generally painting orcs/orks or goblins). My question is, how do you guys do it? How is it that you guys manage to keep the paint out of the cracks?

Any help is appreciated!:yes:

 

[Hinton]

You might be overloading your brush. When a brush is overloaded with paint, as soon as you touch the mini it \"explodes\" and goes everywhere. It\'s a problem that I had for quite a while.

Try to make sure that you\'re getting just the point of the brush in the paint (maybe just a touch more; halfway is too much). It might not look like there\'s very much paint in the brush, but looks can be very deceiving.

After you get some paint on the brush, use something to wick the excess out. Personally, I use my thumb since papertowels and the like seem to pull too much out. Also, using my thumb I have a pretty good idea just how thin my paint is before I touch the mini.

Granted, I\'m still getting the hang of it, so others might have more insight than I do.

 

[QuietiManes]

Yup that should do it. Just need to touch your brush to something that will suck a bit of excess water/paint out of the bristles. What this does is gives you more control, the brush will not let the paint go so easily if there is less of it in the brush, so when you touch the orc/ork with the brush tip, the paint will simply stay right there, without making puddles all over the place because there is far less paint being put onto the model.

It is a big mental problem I have, the WASTE of so much paint, it bothers me, it\'s not even the cost or the environment, it\'s just the waste. More paint goes in the garbage than on the mini\'s, way, way more. But you gotta do what you gotta do. I use paper towels or a sponge usually, on the rare occassion I paint. Even used TP a time or two. Just make sure to use the lint free type of paper products, you don\'t want bits of paper in your paint.

 

[junior elf]

Now, now, there is more than one way to blend different colors. The first is Juicing , for this your paint has to be very diluted (70-80%), the second is wet blending, and the third is the good old blending blending on your palette.

 

[Ritual]

Originally posted by junior elf
...and the third is the good old blending blending on your palette.

What good is a blending on your pallette? You want it on your mini, not on the pallette! lol The link only takes me to the front page of Cyril Abati\'s site. Are you referring to the article about mixing colour nuances? You still need a method to transfer the paint to your mini.

Like people have said, use less paint on your brush, especially when using heavily diluted paint. Also, you need to have patience and discipline, because this way of painting is not quick. It takes time to build up the colour transitions with paint this thin, and the urge to \"cut corners\" can be very strong. It is also important to make sure previous layer is fully dry before applying next one. If not, it is very easy to tear up the previous layer and that can cause grainyness and ugly blotches. When diluting the paint heavily you decrease the amount of binder in a given volume of paint and thus the paint is less durable. If this should cause you big problems you can add some glaze medium, but I usually avoid that as it tastes so horrible.

 

[Einion]

Since you\'re new to forums here\'s a tip: search first There\'s lots of useful information in the archived threads already, just waiting to be read. There are for example at least a half-dozen threads from maybe the past year that mention the solution to your problem.

Even finding threads that weren\'t what you were looking for initially can be surprisingly useful at times; you never know what little tips you might pick up. That\'s why searching is so valuable.

http://www.coolminiornot.com/forums/viewthread.php?tid=27325
http://www.coolminiornot.com/forums/viewthread.php?tid=20650
http://www.coolminiornot.com/forums/viewthread.php?tid=26073
http://www.coolminiornot.com/forums/viewthread.php?tid=26276
http://www.coolminiornot.com/forums/viewthread.php?tid=26101
http://www.coolminiornot.com/forums/viewthread.php?tid=25013
http://www.coolminiornot.com/forums/viewthread.php?tid=23066

Originally posted by Ritual
Like people have said, use less paint on your brush, especially when using heavily diluted paint. Also, you need to have patience and discipline, because this way of painting is not quick. It takes time to build up the colour transitions with paint this thin, and the urge to \"cut corners\" can be very strong.

Patience may be the thing that\'s hardest to learn initially in painting.

Einion

 

[airhead]

Originally posted by Einion
...Patience may be the thing that\'s hardest to learn initially in painting...

Say it again.
and again
and again
...

 

[Aliengod3]

I agree with patience. I am still working on mine. I started painting my minis with about 75% water and I am still transitioning too fast between my colors so that blends look too rough which pisses me off.

One thing I suggest you do is work your way up to using 80% water, baby steps. Paint a couple models with 30% water so that you understand diluted paint a bit better. From there paint a couple of minis with 50% water. Try to notice the difference between the dilutions in order to help yourself understand what sort of control you need to get better blends with more layers. Then try a coule of minis with 70% water. See if you can manage to get a smooth surface, which is not as easy as it sounds. With so many thin layers being applied there are a lot of things that can happen to rough up the minis surface.
Giving yourself a chance to adjst to dilute paint slowly by working your way up to real dilute paint will help you alot in understanding how it works. Jumping into real dilute paint with no knowledge or experience is like dropping into a half-pipe without ever having set foot on a skateboard before (hope this makes sense).

Helpful tips:

1. When you load your brush with paint quickly set the very tip of the brush in the paint and pull it out. You will avoid \"spills\" in the recesses of the minis. Also after you have dipped the tip wipe the bristles on a paper towel before painting. This will get rid of excess moisture.

2. Get a blow dryer. using it to dry your mini after you pass with your brush will guarantee that you are not going to be applying another pass before the ast one has dried.

3. Do not get frustrated if the results are not showing up. It does take a lot of time to progress and, like everyone else has said, patience is important.