Saturday, August 3, 2013

Success with homemade washes

Hi All,

I feel like the homemade washes were a success. I'll let you be the judge.

Reference gray primed horses

With washes applied
So as you can see from left to right Black, Burnt Umber, Raw Umber, and Raw Sienna washes were applied. I think the darker two did well on the gray while the lighter two are harder to tell. It is a little more obvious to the naked eye. Obviously the darker washes darken things up a bit. The washes look very dark when poured into the palette, but when you move them with the brush they have the opacity of skim milk.

So let me know what you think.

In other news I decided on a lark to look up gaming conventions, since it is a goal to go to one in the next year or so. I found two in Mesa, AZ and one in Tuscon, AZ coming up. Maricopa Con looks like exactly what I am looking for. Of course it is happening right now and I'm busy this weekend. Copper Con seems less about gaming and more about Sci-Fi, comics and cosplay. Not really my thing, at least not hardcore. Rincon in October and TusCon in November although neither has much info right now.

I also learned of the passing of Michael Ansara, known to many of us as Kang the Klingon leader from Star Trek.


The New York Times did a piece on him here. Rest in peace Kang. leS tam qeng (I wanted to insert Klingon script here but blogger didn't support it.) I used the Bing translator to translate it here.

 In upcoming posts I'll have some shots of my Orcs from 20 years ago. It's about 37 figures, that by the look of them, I considered finished at the time. Not totally horrifying, but not as awesome as I remember.
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18 comments:

  1. Chris StoesenAugust 4, 2013 at 1:32 AM

    Nice job on the washes.

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  2. TamsinPAugust 4, 2013 at 2:43 AM

    I've been using the Les Burley wash mixes for ages but have found that my black mix can be very opaque. I've also found that the fluid matte medium settles and solidifies sometimes. I think that it might be the brands I used (Golden for the matte; Magic Color ink).

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    Replies
    1. SeanAugust 4, 2013 at 5:57 AM

      Hi Tamsin. The black does darken things up quite a bit so I am wondering about diluting it a tad. I used Golden Matte Medium, Liquitex flow aid, and liquitex acrylic ink for all but black, which was Speedball acrylic ink.

      Delete
  3. Laughing FerretAugust 4, 2013 at 3:37 AM

    honestly I think its a bit hard to tell over grey primer for some of those shades, but it seems like they're flowing properly so I suspect they're working well. I tend to make my own washes as I go, mixing what I need as I need it to control the color.

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    Replies
    1. SeanAugust 4, 2013 at 6:00 AM

      Hi LF. essentially made my own washes when I was experimenting with thinning on the palette. Thus my love/ hate relationship with flow aid. I agree about the gray. The two on the right are barely noticeable, perhaps they just need more ink in the mix.

      Delete
  4. The Angry LurkerAugust 4, 2013 at 5:56 AM

    I like the first two especially, good colour coverage.

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    Replies
    1. SeanAugust 4, 2013 at 6:01 AM

      Thanks Fran. I'm prepping some figures that I plan to prime white so I'll try those two lighted colors on them to see how they go.

      Delete
  5. Justin PenwithAugust 4, 2013 at 8:34 AM

    For me, the trick with black inks is to get it to do its job, without taking white to grey or ick. Perhaps improving the flow of the ink will help it get to where it needs to go and away from where it needs to be thinner.

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    1. SeanAugust 4, 2013 at 11:45 AM

      Hi Justin, you're right it's not quite there for the black especially. I expect some darkening, toning down of the color with the wash, but it is a little heavy with the black still.

      Delete
  6. SeanAugust 4, 2013 at 11:43 AM

    Thanks Loki.

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  7. KevAugust 5, 2013 at 1:44 AM

    Great Idea with the washes Sean.
    Something I never considered. I dont use them much, but may do for the 1/72 Hail Caesar stuff.
    I just used the Water based AP soft tone on a Spartan command and its looks ok, although a bit dark.
    I'll pop a pic on my blog, let me know what you think.

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    Replies
    1. SeanAugust 5, 2013 at 5:26 AM

      Thanks Kev. I've heard a lot of people mention Army Painter products. I'm being stubborn and buying Craft paints and regular art supplies. I'd love to see a picture of your Spartans.

      Delete
  8. AsslessmanAugust 5, 2013 at 2:07 AM

    These washes seem to head the good way, there is just one detail I'm concerned with which is the shining aspect ink gives and which seems to be present on your models. If the pictures on the original link war correct there was no shining effect at all which made it priceless for me. I've been using pva glue to matt down that shining effect with my inks but I'm not a good painter enough to tell if that's the right way to go or not...
    Thanks a lot for this review, I believe it's something which can prove useful to many of us.

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    Replies
    1. SeanAugust 5, 2013 at 5:28 AM

      Hi Asslessman. I think it's the lighting that is causing the shine. I used the camera's flash and both the reference and the wash picture have a shine to them from that. Les is just much better at photography than I. Along with painting and probably a long list of other talents.

      Delete
    2. AsslessmanAugust 5, 2013 at 6:12 AM

      You are right, Could have figured that by myself with a closer look at the reference. Photo skill is quite a difficult one indeed.

      Thanks a lot

      Delete
  9. peterAugust 6, 2013 at 9:49 AM

    The two on the right are good for dark paint, the other ones could work very fine on white, like you suggest!

    Great work!

    Greetings
    Peter

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. SeanAugust 6, 2013 at 3:49 PM

      Thanks for taking a look and commenting Peter.

      Delete

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