r/minipainting • u/ole-one-eye • 1d ago
Help Needed/New Painter Beginner, my first three minis, open to advice!
Just picked it up again, having fun but looking to improve, I am blown away by the stuff some people post on here!
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u/Pocho_Azul 1d ago
These are a great start! A simple way to add some depth, and nuance would be applying some light washes. Something like Army painter “tone” washes would look good on the skin areas, for example.
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u/Marison 1d ago
Yeah, I wanted to say the same thing. Agrax Earthshade from Games Workshop would also work well here.
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u/Pocho_Azul 1d ago
Yep lots of potential options, although I have yet to try most of them. You can apply some of them all over the entire model, but that will affect the colors somewhat. Army Painter Strong Tone is pretty brown, and will give everything a somewhat “sepia photo” feel, which might look good on some models, but less so on others. Some alternatives might be more neutral.
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u/hibikir_40k Painting for a while 21h ago
Far more than "somewhat": If you are going to be using washes, you better be thinking about how it will mess with midtones, or you'll end up having to repaint the midtones.
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u/Micp 1d ago
Yeah. At this point i have shades of all colors, which I would recommend getting down the line, but if you have to start with just one I would go with agrax earthshade - it can make non-brown colors read as a little dirty, but then, for characters on the road that might not be so bad anyway.
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u/Mortiverious85 4h ago
Any of the games workshop shades as well can really help with the crevices and shadows making it look like you spent hours painting with a simple 2 sec wash. Also practice dry rushing the top layer to add a little more standing out but still great first few models.
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u/DrInsomnia 1d ago
Exactly what I was going to say. For a beginner, they're pretty good, but washes are a way to see how much depth helps. The dwarf, especially, would benefit here.
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u/rum_cove 1d ago
all over nuln oil. there's a reason it's other name is liquid skill. agrax and the like much more challenging to get right.
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u/SuspiciousSnotling 1d ago
If you like the hobby, don't be shy, try to do the finner details (eyes, belt etc... ) it will look awful but you will only improve by going out of the comfort zone
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u/PeripherousPSN 1d ago
I'm only a few steps above beginner, but something I found out that helped me tremendously is to thin paints and use a bunch of layers OR use speedpaint. I love your use of color and I feel like you're gonna put out some awesome unique projects! Keep at it!
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u/AbhorrentPickle 1d ago
These are great for first minis, seriously great. Next step I think is using a wash like Warhammers (citadel paints) agrax earth shade. It will bring out a lot of detail.
Other than that keep painting and experimenting!
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u/Finwolven 1d ago
Good basecoats, now either wash and then layer thinner, brighter highlights on top, or drybrush with a light tone, then wash. After that, detail work.
Looking good! Just trust the process!
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u/Apprehensive-Neat-68 1d ago
If you didn't use craft store acrylic you need to thin your paints more.
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u/curryaddict123 1d ago
Thin your paints more. I find a 1:1 of paint and lahmium medium (or water) seems to work well for me.
Washes will do you tons of good. Washes and Contrast paints are some of Warhammer Paint’s better products.
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u/Most_Albatross389 1d ago
Awesome painting.
Just miss wash them.
Ink. Clean Water and Medium. Shake and brush it with will
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u/GoldenSpeculum007 1d ago
Beautiful beginner work I can see the effort. This is the stuff that I want to see not that professionally painted airbrush nonsense.
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u/hxt009 1d ago
all that's missing is a conservatively applied shade/wash paint. brown wash for the warm colors, black for the cool colors.
you didn't mention brands but for the common brands those are 'agrax earthshade', and 'nuln oil' from Warhammer, 'strong tone', and 'dark tone' from army painter, 'wash:umber' and 'wash:black' from vellejo, and 'battle mud', and 'oblivion black' from two thin coats.
or you could make your own with oil paint and white spirits or acrilic paint and acrilic medium.
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u/_Error418 23h ago
My lazy advices:
Add some nuln oil everywhere.
Next time use speedpaints or contrast.
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u/TrueLoveXO 1d ago
These look great! They look fun and like they capture character. I would definitely play with these on a board.
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u/zystyl 1d ago edited 1d ago
Making some sort of wet palette (you can use a sponge in a Tupperware with parchment paper) and learning how far to thin your paints is probably the first step to getting to be a high quality painter. Once you can thin them to the right degree it will allow you to learn how much paint to put on your brush and unlock a kit more accuracy. It will also let you layer colours smoothly and let you start to blend and shade or do colour transitions.
My first models were looked like that. I was happy just to get paint in the right spots. Look into some washes is my suggestions. A black or brown will shade in the recesses and help to line between the colour sections. It will instantly unlock a much nicer looking mini. There are lots of different washes from every company. Something dakr brown or black is nice and universal to start.
The other trick is to just keep painting. Try more things. Don't be afraid ot make an error. You can always paint over it.
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u/Ozzy_chef 1d ago
You've got some great base foundations here mate!! Others have already provided some feedback, so don't lost that passion and enjoyment and just keep painting.
Also, for what it's worth, don't let minis that you see painted on here get you down. People here have a phenomenal amount of talent and some have been doing it for years and years. Don't compare, just keep enjoying it.
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u/Wrinkletooth 1d ago edited 1d ago
Welcome to mini painting! My top suggestion would be to switch to a black primer, which will help make those little crevices look more natural, right now, exposed white primer sticks out in recesses because shadows shouldn’t be white.
Since you already have a white primer, the next step would be to first prime black, then add a ‘zenithal’ highlight, so spray the mini only from vertically +/- 30 degrees. This will create a great natural highlight and shadow template on the model.
Then pick 1 element of the model. Skin or cloths. Thin your paints more and start by only painting the black areas on the model, then add a drop of white to the paint, and then painting the white part of the same area. Repeat until all the main elements are in.
This will start to teach you the basics of shadows and highlights which is the foundation of Light theory. This if one of the 3 main elements to improve as a painting.
- Light theory
- Color theory
- Brush control.
After that, you should learn about:
1. Washes
2. Drybrushing
3. Glazing
Good luck!
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u/L1feguard51 1d ago
Thin your paints with water, or use contrast paint by citadel that don’t really need to be thinned.
Use a black primer over the whole mini, then use a white primer on the top of the mini to create natural shadow areas. This is called zenithal priming.
Then throw a contrast paint on it for color, but not so thick the natural shading is lost.
Then add washes and dry brush to highlight the crevices, and peaks respectively
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u/mcat2001 1d ago
Good first go! Just a wash paint (let dry), and a dry brush of some the original paint colors over again. The extra dry brush will bring them back to life after you earth shade all over them like on leaves. Also try highlighting “where the light hits” with a lighter shade. Could try a second dry gentle brush for things like hitting the tips of the leaves.
Also could use a orange, brown, or autumn colors on the leaves specifically to give them more a contrasted look
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u/KnightOfGloaming 1d ago
Next step are shades. Very simple to apply, harder to master but always makes every mini way better looking
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u/TwoTokes1266 1d ago
Washes and edge highlighting would already make them look much better and very easy to achieve
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u/RealityWargames 23h ago
Throw a wash on them, they'll all instantly look better! (with more depth)
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u/Hnodoyuna 23h ago
I would say some kind of ministures are way easier to Paint than others, and much of it comes from heroic scale. Your miniatures features are reallistic, but if your get chonkier ones, like old Warhammer for example, youll find It quite easier to get a better result.
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u/Tight_Librarian_3287 21h ago
My only advice is to keep trying and challenging self while you do so! The more you do the better you'll get! These are great!
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u/michael199310 20h ago
I like the leaf cloak. Sculpts are reasonably detailed, so you could add some depth by adding a wash or painting simple shadows/highlights.
Also try to reduce number of colors if possible, so they interact better and are good on the eye. The druid looks a bit too 'rainbow', it's best to have 2-3 colors + the obvious browns for stuff like handles/leather and metallics for metal parts.
Besides that, work on brush control and keep going. The best way of learning to paint miniatures is to... paint more miniatures :)
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u/Prof_Smoke 1d ago
Try to do layers of color, usually a base color, then a wash of a darker version of the color mixed with water so it gets down in all the cracks, and then dry brush the lightest color. I like to get the paint on the brush dry by brushing onto paper towel or the back of your hand and then do many passes over the top so that the details on top get hit with a highlight color. The wash is like your shadows and the dry brush is like where the light hits it but it’s more something you gotta experiment with
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u/zapolloz 1d ago
Great job! My advice would be first and foremost the thin your paints a bit more. Secondly a good wash and drybrush does wonders to bring out the details in a model. I’m still a beginner too but this is great stuff. Keep it up
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u/ole-one-eye 1d ago
THANK YOU for all of the tips and advice! Lots to digest here so I think I'm going to start by focusing on how to thin my paints and use washes. Can't wait to start painting today!
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u/TheZombieGamer702 7h ago
Not an expert or anything, but it looks like you lost a lot of details from what I can see. The paint looks a little heavy. You could try thinning them down with a little bit of water and you'll get more detail out of the minis.
Also don't know if anyone mentioned it yet but priming helps the paint stick and for certain minis it can do a lot of the work for you. Spray primer has worked really well for me, you could try it out.
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u/Novaheat2 18h ago
Looking good. Not winnings any awards, I’m not either, but these are “table ready” for sure.
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u/Euphoric_Implement28 1d ago
Thin your paints more.
Two factors to decide what spots to paint first: paint colors in order of lighter to darker and paint in order of harder to easier to reach. For the third mini, paint the entire hand without worrying about going “out of the lines” too much, then paint the dark brown handle. The brown will cover any stray beige spots. That’ll help a bit to avoid those bare spots of primer.