Painting "Tutorial"

Intro

So It's been over a year since my last post and my "return to routine" didn't happen. I have a rough idea about trying to post something once a month in 2026 (seems manageable now) but let's see how it goes.

Over the last year or so I've started becoming much experimental with my kitbashing and painting techniques and a few people asked if I would make a guide or run through of how I've painted my last few sets of models (seen below).

Captain for my Maneater Warband
Model by Knucklebones Miniatures

Troll for my Cauldron Warband
Model by Heoric Scale

Miniatures yet to be assigned a destiny
Models by Heoric Scale

Painting "Tutorial"

The first comment I would like to make is that there is not set route that I follow when painting this way. I kind of just go with what I feel is the next best step. I do however have a general approach that I will detail below.

Feel free to pick this guidance apart, experiment with it, see what works for you and what doesn't and hopefully you'll discover something cool that you can share!

Models

Obviously this technique can be used with any models however I've been really enjoying digitally bashing Matty Knucklebones' miniatures recently. The below models will be used for a cursed cavalcade warband I built to use in Mordheim.

When selecting my palette the models and their setting guide my choices heavily. The ManEater Captain seen above has a heavy bias of green to lean into the warp stone factor of mordheim where as the robot looking models have a much cooler feel with bright blue acrylics and grey enamels.

For the purpose of this post I will be showing updated pics of the fellow below. He is a twisted scholar of the wizard variety with fish mask and duel hammers. 

Base Coat

I've recently been using Montana spray paints for base coating models and terrain. It's super vibrant although can spray a little thick. Essentially I select which obnoxious colour I want to start with and get spraying.

After this I will usually go in with the air brush to add some depth to the model using either lighter or dark tones of a similar colour in an undetermined zenithal style. In this instance I mixed some yellow and orange together and gave the model a rough spray from above.

Once I've reached this point I will usually give the model a quick blast of some matt varnish through the airbrush again just to seal everything down and give a nice finish to further work on.

Time to get messy!

So this next step is probably where the style stands out the most. Honestly it's super fucking easy and a quick way to get a painted model on to the table. It can be the end point or a base on which to work from.

I will generally pick colours which are complimentary to the base coat.

In this instance I've gone with Teals and Magenta's.

I usually start with a dark complimentary colour and using a heavily loaded make up brush I will basically just go HAM on the model with mostly downward strokes but also jamming it into parts of the model which won't get picked up naturally.

This sets a nice contrast on the model from which to apply the brighter colours. 

With this model I chose apply a bright magenta and then a bright teal in a similar fashion.

Now we have an extremely colourful miniature and honestly I get super tempted to just start picking out details at this point and call it a day, however I find that tying these colours together with a wash adds to the desired effect I'm usually going for.

Before I move on to wash the model with an enamel or oil paint I will apply a matte varnish again through the airbrush. This is to protect the model as I generally get a bit too vigorous when performing the reduction process of the next step.

 

Enamels

For this model I decided to go with just humbrol brown enamel wash. The effect is usually pretty good and I know how to work with it without too much trouble. 

For the reduction step I use a combination of rags, cotton buds, make up sponges, and mineral spirit. Just whatever I have lying around to get the desired kind of reduction.

 

I will absolutely douse the model in the wash and then either leave it to dry before reduction or start the reduction while it's still wet again depending on what kind of effect I want to achieve. 

And below the model with the enamel removed to a satisfactory level.

At this point I will usually wait for the enamel to dry and then slap another coat of matte varnish over it. 

More colours

Once the matte varnish has dried we move on to highlighting the model with a lighter magenta and teal. For this next bit I use a larger make up brush and apply a more traditional dry brushing technique.

Reflecting on these two images I feel like the addition of the lighter magenta added too much noise. It's not awful but potentially a step to far and something I will bare in mind for my next set of models.

Final Touches

At this point the "technique" has been detailed and done however I thought I would also add some comments about how I finish the models.

Metallic's

I usually add some degree of metallic paint to my models, I like shiny shit.

For most of the models I'm applying some of this turbo dork stuff to the fishy bits and then for the aristocrat I'm also adding a touch of gold to it's mask.

Glossing, Red Eye and ground cover

For certain sections I like to add some tamiya clear coat and I'm a big fan of dropping white ink into eye's or lenses and then covering with tamiya red clear coat (great stuff).

Also I haven't been able to get enough of the krautcover "a tale of grimdark" basing material!

And with these final touches the model and in this case warband is complete...

Thanks for reading and I'll most likely see you in a years time or so.