Painting "Wet" Miniatures? (Like Rain)

[TopHatCat]

So I've recently been working on my FEC and was thinking up what paint scheme I'll be wanting to use...

I had the idea that I'd love to paint my mini's as if they were in the rain, so it brought up the question... is there a way to paint your miniature so it looks "wet"? Asif it's standing in a HEAVY downpour? I can't even begin to imagine how you'd accomplish this and it's likely out of my skill range. However I thought I'd ask just in case some company out there sells a "water wash" or something like that! (Surely someone out there with Idoneth army has tried this!? Haha)

If not, what paints/technical/textures would you recommend for incredibly sloshy-muddy bases? I've seen GW sell a pot of mud texture but no idea if it's any good.
Also any tips/techniques for painting mud ONTO the miniature (like splattered on their backs/shoulders asif they've been hiding or slipping in it) would be fantastic too!

Thanks in advance for any and all help!
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[daveboy]

Hey,

good idea. I think there are certain ways to achieve something like "wet". Just look at pictures of materials you want to be wet when they are actually wet in real life. So cloth will be much darker and gets a border to the try cloth, so is suede. Other leather wont get wet just gets a little more gloss which u can archieve with varnish, just make up your mind!

just thnking, havent done it myself so.

[sorokyl]

Stirland mud is ok, you can make the sand thing at home... brown craft paint + sand + spackle in equal parts (Lookup Luke's APS on youtube he has a guide).  Several citadel texture paints are very similar just different colors. I don't like using those pots when basing a whole army because it gets kind of expensive (you could use a whole pot for a 130mm base... ) I use citadel pots for convenience when maybe adding a new model to an army, but when basing a whole armies worth I just mix up some based on the above. 

To make things "wet" all I can think of is "glossy".  Citadel Ard Coat is a clear gloss paint. If you needed a ton of it could make your own with "gloss medium" at a craft store, but ard coat will be cheaper if you just need the one pot. 

To apply "mud" to minis, I recommend Citadel Typhus Corrosion. It's marketed as "oily rust" but really it's a very watery brown paint with some grit in it. 

For both the base and the Typhus corrosion mud, you can apply some gloss to make it look wet. 

For a big puddle, look into some of the Vallejo water effects.  Also recommend just youtubing what you want to do and you'll probably find someone doing it. 

[TopHatCat]

Yeah I was thinking maybe, getting some gloss and mixing in small parts of a blue glaze/ink to make it a ~little~ bit blue, paint the models bit darker then very lightly blue gloss on them, make them look soaked through. Will likely have some extra models I can experiment on.

Thanks for the advice for the mud! I'll check out Typhus Corrosion see how it does. Plus yes! Seen lots of videos to make your own Stirland Mud (I did a google of it to see the effects and most results were how to make your own haha!).

The reason I made a thread is because I know in like, the miniature-train community they have all sorts for making rivers and fields of grass and so on, so wondered if there were anything for mud effects or decent water-effect paints (looking up Vallejo water effects now, I keep hearing good things about it). I'm guessing Vallejo water effects applied to models does not look good? Haha

[Eevika]

This is probably like the hardest thing you could ever try if you actually want something to look like its wet from rain. Probably harder than osl or nmm. You probably want to do like a regular base and then a thin layer of epoxy/water texture and then make tiny splashes on that so it looks like water hittinh it. Then you need to paint realistic water textures on flesh and cloth. Just slapping something like ard coat on stuff will just give you shiny minis. Trying to make something to look like it is currently under heavy downpour just sounds like hell

 

[TopHatCat]

Yeah that's what I thought when I made the post Eevika hahaha, but was asking in case anyone knew a work around or had made some magic water texture lol! I wouldn't be too bothered about having actual like, raindrop splashes on them or having water dripping off them, just having them "look" "dripping wet"/soaked through, would be fine.... but yeah can't think of any easy ways that's for sure haha.

So might just settle with making them look muddy and having lots of mud/puddles on the bases

[Lior'Lec]

     To give them a water drip effect you could take medium CA glue (after a matte varnish) and a fine applicator to create some water runners going down the model. Using a toothpick pull the droplet down to get the effect you want and once satisfied hit it with a quick spray of CA cure then lightly apply gloss varnish to the the dried glue.

     I’ve done this on fishing line to create a running water effect on a fountain but to be honest I’m not certain how it would look on a mini. The original idea came from the hirstarts build pages. You could also pool a small amount of the glue and use a small gauge wire to apply droplets where you want them in a similar fashion (actually may test that one myself and see how it comes out).

[KingB]

The trouble you'd have is the models themselves. Hair and fur would be matted down, and cloth would hang more heavily. Posture would be a problem, too; people and animals tend to hunch their shoulders and turn their faces down in the rain.

I really love the idea and wanted to do it myself, but could never get it to look right. I wanted to do Skaven in a city (Nuln) at night in the rain. I was able to make wet cobbled paving look quite nice by paining it very dark with sharp highlights (as though illuminated by the moon (white) or gas street lighting (yellow)), and using gloss varnish to make it look wet. But I never got the figures to look right.

Sorry I can't help, but I shall be keeping an eye on this thread and hope to be proved wrong.

[Hamigua]

so there are many ways to get wet or swampy bases

i linked a Jungle water tutorial here  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Li0VsVAKZmg

The tutorial is probably not really what you are looking for if you are just looking for something muddy or swampy, but i think the same principles apply. You couls just do a shallow layer and color the water brown/green instead of blue.

The main problem is getting your model to look wet. Its all going to come down to how you paint your models. When clothes get wet, usually the colors are more muted, and are more darker, so adjust your palette accordingly. Don't use bright colors. For mud, you can splatter brow paint near the bottom of cloaks or boots. Using an old toothbrush and running your finger along the bristles can help you spray some random speckles over a cloak. Try to pick models that don't have fluffy hair or feathers in hats or etc. 

Some people are saying to put gloss on your model. I think for hard surfaces, and maybe skin you could do that, but definitely don't put gloss on clothes or surfaces that would soak up liquid.

I hope this helps.