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Painting amazing miniatures and figurines
When painting miniatures for war games or dioramas they often come out looking very flat and unrealistic. This is because they do not have enough relief to properly cast shadows on their own. For example, the clothing on a person will have some folds and wrinkles that are partially in shadow. When reproduced in miniature, those same clothing folds are so small they won't cast a visible shadow, making them look subtly 'wrong' to the eye. Thus when painting miniatures, dolls, or figurines you need to add a final highlight and shadow layer to fake depth. Paint your miniature as normal. When you have finished, you will add the highlight first. Take a fan brush that is bone dry. Get a tiny amount of white on it and just barely dust the whole miniature with it. Try it out on a hand first to make sure you are just barely touching. This will lighten all the raised surfaces that are closest to the viewer. Let dry. Now go make a wash of black paint diluted with water. Check how diluted the color is on a piece of paper. It should be roughly the same shade as a pencil mark. Wash the whole figure with the wash, starting from top to bottom. It will pool in the hollows and folds, adding fake shadows. You may need to blot the figure slightly during the washing process if droplets are forming on the underside of arms, legs, etc. If they aren't blotted, they'll leave a sharp black line on the underside of the figure's arm. If you are dealing with an item that has an extremely slick, shiny surface, you may want to go back and highlight again. This is recommended for getting a metal finish. Black items deserve special attention because they cannot be washed. Instead, they should be dry brushed with white two or three times until they are almost a dark gray rather than black. The accompanying picture shows an example of one of my sculptures with black fur that has been heavily dry brushed. |
Example of dry brushing a black figure
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I remember doing fantasy miniatures like this! It was a lot of fun. If I wanted to keep a cloak or uniform element brilliant, like a mage whose clothing might be less likely to get dirty, I shaded with a thin wash of a dark color related to the main color -- maroon on red, deep blue on blue, that sort of thing. When I shaded faces, I'd mix white with the skin tone for the highlight and brown with it for the shadowing -- this really looks good on Ral Partha figures. A touch of pink or red in the same mix and going across the lips with a 10-0 brush helps a lot on human or elven faces. Beards and hair on dwarves, elves and humans look so real with drybrush highlighting. On black hair you can add a dash of blue to the highlight to give it a shining blue-black look. When I wanted soldiers, peasants and adventurers to look tough and battle-worn, I used a dark brown instead of black and dusted with ivory or Sand rather than white, this would mute the colors of their clothing and still give that three dimensional effect. Painting miniature figures is a lot of fun and I miss my collection. I may start up again sometime, especially if I can find a group to bring them out and set them up for figures gaming. I had the big army of evil for my old group and was always welcomed!
Scary lookin critter looks like ma dawg with a pork chop.
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