Painting trouble

[snikrot]

when the new DE codex came out i decided to update all my models and i started painting them a few weeks ago now for some reason i cant seem to get them to look good. i have never hade trouble painting anything before to at least tabletop quality but ne matter how long i spend on one model it just ends up looking kinda funky at the end. so i was just wondering if this has happend to other people where there are some models or an army you just cant seem to get painted right?

[fuzzbuket]

what colours are you using it could be a contrast issue.or it could be too many colours?

i was just painting a scourge and i havent had any problems (apart from glueing the wings on befor painting)

-fuzz

p.s. merchiter red+ chaos black, then blended up to bone looks awsome on DE armour!

[rogue.trader.voril]

Throughout the five editions I have played and painted almost every army. I only started playing DE recently (since the new minis have been out), and while I think they are some of the best miniatures GW has ever put out, they have got me stuck in a painting block. In the last two years (or so) I have painted most days, even if it's only for 15 minutes... I've been trying to get a simple color scheme (black, bronze, and red) to work on them seems nearly impossible right now. I haven't painted in almost a month.

Maybe it's just another way the DE torment the human race ;)

[snikrot]

i am useing a dark blue with a scab red highlight i dont really think the colors are a problem its just that my figures look messy and un finished and i have never had the problem before. i have tried 4 differnt paint schemes and i just cant find one that fits

[fuzzbuket]

theres your problem, i think that the problem is its too dark! am i correct that it looks slightly purple? thats because instead of your highlights going to a light colour its staying dark and only changing colours, not highlighting it: the soloution?
theres a few:
swapping the blue for black and highlighting up to a brighter red (blood red is quite good) and if you want to keep the blueness give it a wash of purple

swapping the red for a blue. and highlighting to a light blue

oh and keep the eyes/ details quite bright colours.


-fuzz

[snikrot]

i already tried the light blue on black but it looked kinda funky. i am going to try the blood red highlights though

[house_cawdor]

I think most people have been stuck at one point or another. I am currently stuck on my Eldar. I was going to black for an ulthwe strike force, but I was not satisfied with the black no matter what I did. It just looks so blah as a main color on them since they have smooth surfaces. I have seen a black and purple scheme, but I dont want to copy schemes! So, I have been working on building them and painting other things for now...

[fuzzbuket]

heres a tip for the eldar

( i had a problem with them too :P )
:in eldar language, conveyed through the medium of dance:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWucYbAp8Lk


or realisticly: if your armour plates dont look smooth and eldar enough
paitn whole thing dark grey
badab black wash
thin grey highlights
then blend the armour plates
thin your paints and try to get as smooth a blend as possible.

this should mean that the model looks less cluttered and that the armour plates stick out.

i hope that helps :)

-fuzz

[rickyard]

Perhaps the problem with DE is that they're very spiky, perhaps they got a lot of pointy details that you try to line with a colour and then you really don't light up the base colour with a lighter version, you paint the pointy things with another colour so the base doesn't have lights. Don't know, but perhaps you should try to paint black, then slightly drybrush with white , painting lines with white, and then washing with a red ink or even using half watered down red. You'll se the red perfectly in the white zones but should'nt be appearing in the blackened ones.

[Thornblood]

I think there could be a colour wheel problem- red and blue are to far apart from each other. If it was purple highlighted up to ice blue or blood red it might look better.

I painted a friends DE army in Dark Angels green with adding Hawk turquoise and then Ice blue. I painted them by just wetbrushing/overbrushing and then drybrushing, heavily black washing it and then doing the detail work building up the highlights of the armour segments. They looked pretty good. On the big raiders I used Vellejo's wash medium (or whatever its called) and added it to DA Green, which gave me DA green ink to put on the big panels.

Your colour scheme sounds similar. so maybe adapting that might work?

Also, dark red is very difficult to paint well, because its quite close to brown. Light red is almost impossible to paint, because once you add white to red, you get pink.

Maybe try the following; Necron Abyss (foundation paint), then add Liche Purple, then Lichepurple mixed with Skull white. For really good results, put in staggered mixes between each of the three colours.

Or; Lichepurple and chaos black mix, Red gore, blood red (then choose blood red with a little bit of skull white or blazing orange as the highlight)

Or; Lichepurple and chaos black mix,, that mix with enchanted blue, enchanted blue, ice blue.


Hope these help.