Painting Tutorial: Painting 'Solid' Yellow

[Nanolathe]

Rules for Painting

1. Clean water, and lots of it.
2, High quality brushes. This is a hobby, if you're not willing to go that extra few [insert currency here] to get a nice horsehair brush, then resign yourself to 'mucky' looking figures.
3. Patience.
4. Practice.
5. Practice.

Rules for painting yellow

1. <See, Rules for Painting>.
2. Not just 'yellow' paint. Yes, we are going to do layers! And lots of them.
3. Even more patience than the normal Rules for Painting.

Now. I for one find a tutorial useless without an example. So in an effort to make mine useful... here, an example, be .

Here you can see the 4 'steps' needed for a proper coat of yellow. As you may have noticed I have not 'under-coated' the model in the standard way with a black or white spray. This I did for one reason. Sprays are not the friendliest when it comes to preserving detail. 8 years of spray paint under-coats and I still can't get it right all the time. This model was entered for a competition and so I wanted it perfect. If you don't want or need perfect then feel free to do whatever you feel comfortable with.

Step One: The Base Coat
As many of the more experienced among you have guessed, this is Snakebite Leather, and of course we all kno..

STOP!

Step away from the paint pot and put the brush down. Don't you dare think to just take paint straight from the pot and slap it on the figure. Rule 1. Clean water, and lots of it. Take your brush and get it wet. Not dripping, but just nicely wet. Now take that and put it on a mixing pallet (the back of a dinner plate works just as well) and mix the water at least 50:50 with the paint. Good, you are ready to paint now.
When you put this on it's not going to give you great coverage. Don't turn round and say "WTF kind of crap tutorial is this... the paint isn't even on the figure properly" because I will beat you with a stick if you do. This is going to take time, wait for each coat to dry and then add another until the model, vehicle or 'bit' that you want to be yellow is completely brown.

Step Two: Lightening the Base Coat
Repeat Step One but replace Snakebite Leather with Bubonic Brown. you do not need to be as thorough with this step as you were with Step One. (see example)
This Step is important. Do not move forward to Step Three until this is done. Trust me, you'll thank me later.

Step Three: Yellow!
This one you need to be a bit more careful with. Take you paint (switched to Golden Yellow) as before and still using a 50:50, or if you're really impatient 70:30 mix of paint and water and begin painting the raised sections. you do not want the paint to be in the recessed areas, such as where two pieces of armour come together, leave these painted Bubonic Brown. You should be noticing that the yellow is actually leaving the brush and looking yellow. Still, you will need at least 2 if not 4 coats to get this bit right. (depending on how much you dilute the paint)

"But why not jst use the piant strait form teh pot... this is takeing F0r3vA|2!"

*Sigh*
Ok, look at you previous attempts to paint yellow... do they look... 'Lumpy' to you? I'm guessing yes. Know why? because you used paint straight from the bloody pot. Do you want quality or speed? You can't have both.

Step Four: The Final Coat
Sunburst Yellow. 50:50. No exceptions. Paint until bright yellow (only 1 or two coats if you're lucky) Highlight with 50:50 Sunburst Yellow and Skull White. Done. Expert looking yellow. (see example)

I hope this helps you all out a bit.

[Mart007]

+rep.

This may look like a harsh tut. But if you dont thin your paints then your never gonna get a clean look

and by the way - Firm but fair tut thank you! this is exellent!....though re-iterarates, yellow is a sod!

I like you Nanolathe, you speak your mind.

[Nanolathe]

Truth hurts

[experiment 626]

of corse, for us lazy gits, there's those lovely new foundation yellows!
anyways though, nice work! mastering how to paint yellow well is no easy feat...

btw, as a fellow lamenters fan, here's a shot of my librarian acolyte; stitch's 'paint or die' WIP
i still have yet to do the chapter symbol though - still a wee bit uneasy about the prospect of it as the checker pattern turned out better than i'd hoped it would... (so i'm terrified of screwing it up!)

do you have any more lamenters done/in-progress?!

cheers!

[GriplionGremlin]

good tut dude! applies to all colors not just yellow but more important to the lighter colors as they are much less forgiving.


@ stitch -
how dare you mention your wip when you haven't shown any work being done on it!!!!! i've issued out cattle prods already you better get some work done there miss!

[experiment 626]

Originally Posted by GriplionGremlin

@ stitch -
how dare you mention your wip when you haven't shown any work being done on it!!!!! i've issued out cattle prods already you better get some work done there miss!

i know... sadly i've turned my attention to eldar & tyranids for now

cheers!

[Rellik]

wow that looks awesome!

[Nanolathe]

@Stitch. It is possible.

Unfortunately this Lamenter was a one off done for a competition. No more are planned as of today.
@All. If you haven't seen the finnished result, well I'll help you out and post a link

[Dragoon King]

I don't know if I'll ever use much yellow, but having this tut helps if I do! Giving ya some rep.

[TheKiller333]

Very useful Nano.
Plus Rep & A sweet little thank you

[hairyyahoo]

ROFLMAO!!! this is a beaut all right. pretty pics, detailed descriptions and the threat of stick-beatings...this tut has it all!

a very well deserved +rep from me

[iNsOmNiAc'S dReAm]

Great tut, clean and easy to understand. Yellow is a hard color to work with, almost as hard as working with white. Im sure alot of people will benefit from this tut, Two thumbs up!

I'd also like to point out to Stitch, even foundation paints should be thinned

[Captain Slow]

okay. first and foremost
+ rep, right now for that tut nano! life saver! ive been looking for a good tut that didnt ionvolve foundation paints, and wasnt a horrible banna yellow, and i have to say, yours is the best yet!

only prob now is that i need to get more paints! T_T

[Nanolathe]

If only you had the power to give me Rep Cptn Slow
No matter, I appreciate the gesture. I'll see if I can get to work on a white Tut.

[Brother Warchild]

You def give A great tut .Very easy to follow and well said,Thanks a bunch.

[Captain Slow]

hmm.....damn. good point nano.

but just a qucik question, you said you didnt undercoat the model you used in the demo. now, i have a metal model, and i just know the diffrence in colour of the model, EG its silver not grey. WILL cause a diffrence in the yellow. so, do you think undercaoting with Codex grey, or maybe even astronimican would be a god idea before painting a Metal model in this style, as. i really like the effect you get when you DONT undercoat the model.

[Nanolathe]

The whole point of undercoating it in Snakebite should render whatever 'base' colour the model is irrelevant. That first step is the most important, so don't continue until the Snake-Leather is a pure colour.

[munkey joe paints]

Nano....Thanks for the Tut!!! Thats the way I do it and it works well for me. And IMHO Nanolathe did not stress ENOUGH the importance of watering down paints for a smoth transition. If you water down too much on your plate (what I use as a plalatte) just wait a min or 2 and it'll thicken up OR just paint it in several layers.

Great Tut!!

[Captain Slow]

Nano, i love you. and i want to have your babies.

Jk, Jk.
but seriously, ive just finsihed the first coat of golden yellow on the first of a series of three tester marines for my fists.
its not as good as yours, due to my lack of l33t painting skills. however, i think it looks ace!

My advice to anyone. do this, even if its just as a practise, its an arse to do at first, but once you finally se the model start to turn yellow.....i cannot describe it. NANO! THANK YOU!!
and if i could give you rep i would, seriously, a bucket load.
: adore:

[Petey1016]

the scales on the bottom left of the post is where rep is given dave.

[Lord Commander Erus]

Even if your posts don't add to 100 yet, when they hit it, all the rep you give is approved.