I've hit a plateau with my painting and need some feedback.

[Superking]

Hi guys. I really need someone to just be brutally honest and tell me what I can do to improve my painting. I improved from being a really ****** painted to "ok" over a few years and now I feel like I'm hardstuck at the painting level you see below, which I think could use a lot of improvement.

Please point out what I need to improve. I really can't figure it out. The hearthguard is the most recently painted but I had taken a break of 4-5 months.

Thank you
Superking

 

Edited February 2, 2020 by Superking

[Overread]

You look a bit like you're at a point where increasing in skill will be in small steps often through practice and trying out other ideas rather than at a point where there's big leaps you can make.

 

One thing that does look like you could work on it is the blending of colours on the fire-blade. The blade really stands out well as a fire effect, but at the same time each of the three colours is a really distinct band of its own. Now it might be a style you've gone for or it might be that wet-blending and merging colours one into the next is something you could work on. 

[Superking]

It was my first attempt at fire. The other dwarf heroes are more recent. 

[Kenvs]

You may want to start getting alot more selective with your washes, if they are applied all over things tend to look dirty, if you apply just in the recesses you will have a sharper looking finish.  Same deal with highlights, drybrush will always be powdery and manually applying line by line will look sharp er.

[MarkK]

I found that a wet pallet was the biggest change that improved my painting, opened up a lot of techniques like glazing and blending, that and trying to use washes more conservatively instead of the GW method of washing all over. 

I'm trying to add more colours through thin glazes to my skin tones, purples for recesses and reds for cheeks, example spoilered below

[Kramer]

What about OSL as a new skill to learn? 
Or something else new? That would het the feeling of improvement back the fastest. 

[Malios]

Your style is very GW with the colour choices and highlighting. There's nothing wrong with that, and you do it quite well. But its time to broaden your horizons with fresh ideas and styles.

Within GW, look at the Forge World masterclass books. Forge World paint in a very different style to "the citadel method" and may open up some new ways for you to experiment with.

Outside of GW, look up the likes of Angel Giraldez on facebook + youtube. He also has his own book range. He paints in a different style to GW and almost exclusively uses Vallejo gear + paint. His techniques are difficult at first but achievable with the citadel paint range (which I'm assuming you own.)

There are also other artists out there like Richard Grey, The Cult of Paint (Andy Wardle, Henry Steele etc) and even John Blanche who have their own style and ideas which is well worth looking into. These guys are consistently in the top entries of the Golden Daemon for a reason. Experiment with their ideas: some may work for you.

Also look beyond tabletop wargaming into the scale modelling and diorama community for different styles. AK Interactive as a brand has some great tutorial books for example. The use of weathering powders and mediums, the use of chipping effects, the use of enamel-based washes and paints for different effects etc. Lots of styles to take and  choose from. Its a shame that "tabletop wargamers" and "scale modellers" often see themselves as two different hobbies: both hobbies each have their own great ideas (tabletop wargaming often utilises more vast colour selection and highlights for effect whereas the scale modellers have great tricks for creating weathering and realism) and can learn alot from each other.

And finally, I'd really look at getting an airbrush and making your own wet palette. It opens up many additional doors as another tool at your disposal.

With new techniques and styles to play with, you can experiment more to push beyond what you know.

Hopefully this helps.

Edited February 6, 2020 by Malios

[Nos]

First point: I know you dont want to hear this but your things look cool and a hobby should be fun, so dont beat yourself up. If you're keen to improve because that's an ambition of yours and it excites you, fantastic that will be a rewarding venture.

But dont apologise for your stuff or feel as though it's not good enough. If it's not good enough for you  focus on the fact you want to improve and that to do that you have to build on something and practice, but dont look at your inadequacies as you might perceive them as something awful that needs to be escaped. It's a journey. You're further on now than you were a year ago. Keep at it and you'll go further. 

 There is no other criteria. Literally no-one gets to tell you if you're stuff is good enough. It's yours. 

Onto advice:

I would suggest you focus on contrast. This is by far the biggest thing that helped me.

If you look at your photos through a black and white filter (done this for you below) you will see there is not much dynamic range. The three guys at the back are too dark/smudgey, the guy at the front right is too bright.

Your eye looks for values at this scale to differentiate details , as the model is too small for the natural shadows and highlights created by natural light to be of much distinction. If you look at say a piece of furniture or clothing your eye can see shadows and shift in colour through how the light is filtered because those are big enough for your eye to distinguish. But a 28mm model is way too small for your eye to pick up on that and it's natural shadows are tiny. Accentuating Contrast is basically a way of tricking your eye into seeing those tiny values, or even  creating them.

If you look at my Stormcast below you'll note that you can immediately see their outline, distinguishing features, details etc. You have no idea what colour they are but it dosent matter. You can see the models and their respective features clearly, and what different elements I wanted to draw attention to, heads in particular, are much more prominent than say belt buckles.

If you focus on creating a bigger difference between your darkest tones, mid tones and high tones, you will probably be much happier with your results and once you know how it works you can create far more dynamic results .

I recommend focussing more on those elements as you paint, rather than just assume a base, shade, highlight will give good contrast, as it often dosent. Think about what you're painting beforehand. People always look at weapons and faces first. It makes sense to invest heavily in these. If you put the same amount of effort into a belt buckle as you do a face in most issues you're just creating tension and reducing contrast. By definition you wont have any contrast if you paint the same everywhere.

With my SC below I spent a lot of time working through the tones of the armour but very little on anything else. You'll see the helmet plumes the Primes are holding is just one colour for example, didnt highlight at all. This was because I didnt want a bright beautiful headdress to detract from the main event which is their armour plate. There wouldn't have been anything *wrong* with highlighting it up bit I wanted to emphasise the uniform monolithic nature of the SC and bold individual details of leaders didnt serve this object for me. Alternatively though had I wanted to really broadcast the Primes as important individuals it would have made sense to go to town on their helmet decoration. The point is the colour is irrelevant, you can create tremendous feel and tone just through selective contrast. 

One of the easiest ways to start improving contrast is just to focus loads on the Head, then a bit less on the torso and arms and weapon, less again on legs, then barely touch the feet. Just any figure you like, as a test. Or change it up and do the same but prioritise a shield, or torso or whatever. It might look a mess or weird but one bit at least will look really good and it absolutely will look more interesting than something which is flat and without volume. Once you get good at it you can split that idea into different smaller parts, so as well as focussing on painting the head, focus on creating contrast on it too. All my SC have a bright forehead and much less highlighting on their nose and raised parts etc as they are usually given, because I felt it made their faces more dramatic somehow. 

And it really opens things up because its colour neutral. If you understand contrast you can paint something shades of entirely brown and have it look more vibrant and exciting than a miniature painted with dozens of tropical tones. It's also completely indifferent to technique, you dont need to learn anything, you can do it with layers, drybushing, sponging, blending, the application dosent matter, it's not about how you put the paint on, it's where you put it. If you learn how to do contrast well you can make drybushed stuff look more impressive than fine blends.

You can basically make any model look good with any colours if you understand how it works. By the same token, if you focus on the traditional stuff that tends to be based around application, if you're not putting your paint in whatever form it is in places that create interest, it really dosent matter. Models without good contrast however gorgeously and delicately painted will always look less dramatic than something with a good contrast value. 

Edited February 6, 2020 by Nos

[Superking]

On 2/6/2020 at 7:13 PM, Nos said:

First point: I know you dont want to hear this but your things look cool and a hobby should be fun, so dont beat yourself up. If you're keen to improve because that's an ambition of yours and it excites you, fantastic that will be a rewarding venture.

But dont apologise for your stuff or feel as though it's not good enough. If it's not good enough for you  focus on the fact you want to improve and that to do that you have to build on something and practice, but dont look at your inadequacies as you might perceive them as something awful that needs to be escaped. It's a journey. You're further on now than you were a year ago. Keep at it and you'll go further. 

 There is no other criteria. Literally no-one gets to tell you if you're stuff is good enough. It's yours. 

Onto advice:

I would suggest you focus on contrast. This is by far the biggest thing that helped me.

If you look at your photos through a black and white filter (done this for you below) you will see there is not much dynamic range. The three guys at the back are too dark/smudgey, the guy at the front right is too bright.

Your eye looks for values at this scale to differentiate details , as the model is too small for the natural shadows and highlights created by natural light to be of much distinction. If you look at say a piece of furniture or clothing your eye can see shadows and shift in colour through how the light is filtered because those are big enough for your eye to distinguish. But a 28mm model is way too small for your eye to pick up on that and it's natural shadows are tiny. Accentuating Contrast is basically a way of tricking your eye into seeing those tiny values, or even  creating them.

If you look at my Stormcast below you'll note that you can immediately see their outline, distinguishing features, details etc. You have no idea what colour they are but it dosent matter. You can see the models and their respective features clearly, and what different elements I wanted to draw attention to, heads in particular, are much more prominent than say belt buckles.

If you focus on creating a bigger difference between your darkest tones, mid tones and high tones, you will probably be much happier with your results and once you know how it works you can create far more dynamic results .

I recommend focussing more on those elements as you paint, rather than just assume a base, shade, highlight will give good contrast, as it often dosent. Think about what you're painting beforehand. People always look at weapons and faces first. It makes sense to invest heavily in these. If you put the same amount of effort into a belt buckle as you do a face in most issues you're just creating tension and reducing contrast. By definition you wont have any contrast if you paint the same everywhere.

With my SC below I spent a lot of time working through the tones of the armour but very little on anything else. You'll see the helmet plumes the Primes are holding is just one colour for example, didnt highlight at all. This was because I didnt want a bright beautiful headdress to detract from the main event which is their armour plate. There wouldn't have been anything *wrong* with highlighting it up bit I wanted to emphasise the uniform monolithic nature of the SC and bold individual details of leaders didnt serve this object for me. Alternatively though had I wanted to really broadcast the Primes as important individuals it would have made sense to go to town on their helmet decoration. The point is the colour is irrelevant, you can create tremendous feel and tone just through selective contrast. 

One of the easiest ways to start improving contrast is just to focus loads on the Head, then a bit less on the torso and arms and weapon, less again on legs, then barely touch the feet. Just any figure you like, as a test. Or change it up and do the same but prioritise a shield, or torso or whatever. It might look a mess or weird but one bit at least will look really good and it absolutely will look more interesting than something which is flat and without volume. Once you get good at it you can split that idea into different smaller parts, so as well as focussing on painting the head, focus on creating contrast on it too. All my SC have a bright forehead and much less highlighting on their nose and raised parts etc as they are usually given, because I felt it made their faces more dramatic somehow. 

And it really opens things up because its colour neutral. If you understand contrast you can paint something shades of entirely brown and have it look more vibrant and exciting than a miniature painted with dozens of tropical tones. It's also completely indifferent to technique, you dont need to learn anything, you can do it with layers, drybushing, sponging, blending, the application dosent matter, it's not about how you put the paint on, it's where you put it. If you learn how to do contrast well you can make drybushed stuff look more impressive than fine blends.

You can basically make any model look good with any colours if you understand how it works. By the same token, if you focus on the traditional stuff that tends to be based around application, if you're not putting your paint in whatever form it is in places that create interest, it really dosent matter. Models without good contrast however gorgeously and delicately painted will always look less dramatic than something with a good contrast value. 

Sorry to necro the thread but I had to take a long break from the hobby and never got the chance to try these tips. Plan to give it a go over the next week and post results.

Is it possible to get a picture of the stormcast without a filter so I can compare that too?

Cheers.