My first paint job. Thoughts?

[GermanRedrum]

So I wanted to get back into consuming and what not. First pic was my Vader with my son when I was the Midwest Garrison Commander Of The 501st.
Second is odd a Poe blaster I was trying to learn techniques on. Critiques are welcome. How else will I get better, right??

 

[Grimstuff]

Fundamentals look alright. One little thing I can chime in on though is it looks like you're not thinning your weathering paint enough, and/or not working to 'clean' it up enough after application.

With oil/acrylic weathering like that you want it to look fairly soft and diffuse, but the brush strokes are pretty distinct and obvious there on yours. Generally you want to get the paint pretty wet into a wash, then cover it all over where you want weathered. Then pretty much try to clean it off again with a dry rag. Idea being that you'll never really be able to get it perfectly clean again, with the grim staying in all the recesses and texture of the surface like real dirt and grime will. Depending on how thin/thick the weathering paint is, and how much you actually do try to scrub it back off, you can get various levels of weathering. From almost spotless with only grime in the recesses that thinner paint and more scrubbing will offer (good for smooth chrome surfaces that would clean easily irl), or a more general weathered film over the whole thing that thicker paint and weaker cleaning will give (good for more rougher materials or just things you want to look generally really old and worn). Doing it both ways with several different shades of paint can give best results for a diversity of grime.

A few brushed or splattered on bits can work well too for scuffs and grime splatter, but best to keep those pretty conservative.

 

[GermanRedrum]

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[GermanRedrum]

Fundamentals look alright. One little thing I can chime in on though is it looks like you're not thinning your weathering paint enough, and/or not working to 'clean' it up enough after application.

With oil/acrylic weathering like that you want it to look fairly soft and diffuse, but the brush strokes are pretty distinct and obvious there on yours. Generally you want to get the paint pretty wet into a wash, then cover it all over where you want weathered. Then pretty much try to clean it off again with a dry rag. Idea being that you'll never really be able to get it perfectly clean again, with the grim staying in all the recesses and texture of the surface like real dirt and grime will. Depending on how thin/thick the weathering paint is, and how much you actually do try to scrub it back off, you can get various levels of weathering. From almost spotless with only grime in the recesses that thinner paint and more scrubbing will offer (good for smooth chrome surfaces that would clean easily irl), or a more general weathered film over the whole thing that thicker paint and weaker cleaning will give (good for more rougher materials or just things you want to look generally really old and worn). Doing it both ways with several different shades of paint can give best results for a diversity of grime.

A few brushed or splattered on bits can work well too for scuffs and grime splatter, but best to keep those pretty conservative.

When you say "thinning your weathering paint" or “get paint pretty wet” or put the paint in a “wash”, what does that mean?

 

[Grimstuff]

Oh yeah no problem. Pretty much the different thicknesses of paints you can get by thinning them can give all sorts of different effects, and there's a few sorta major categories of paint depending on how thin they are. Normal paints straight out of the pot, Brushable paints which are thinned slightly to brush on smoother, airbrushable paints which are thinned more significantly to go through an airbrush, and then wash paints which are thinned very significantly and used to weather stuff by being 'washed' over the whole piece then cleaned off.

There's also two major types of paint themselves, acrylics and oils. Acrylics can be thinned with regular water, oils must be thinned with oil solvents such as mineral spirits. There's also laquers which are sort of a type of oil paint, but they're mostly specialized spray paints.

But yeah, weathering, like you're doing there on that big chrome section in the center, are almost universally done with washes. Very rarely in real life will you see weathering that is distinct brush-like strokes, it's almost always a more diffuse dirt. The exception are scuffs and such, but those should be a separate layer of weathering done after washing.

Here's a video that'll show some basic acrylic washing

Check out a lot of his videos, they're great resources.

 

[GermanRedrum]

Oh yeah no problem. Pretty much the different thicknesses of paints you can get by thinning them can give all sorts of different effects, and there's a few sorta major categories of paint depending on how thin they are. Normal paints straight out of the pot, Brushable paints which are thinned slightly to brush on smoother, airbrushable paints which are thinned more significantly to go through an airbrush, and then wash paints which are thinned very significantly and used to weather stuff by being 'washed' over the whole piece then cleaned off.

There's also two major types of paint themselves, acrylics and oils. Acrylics can be thinned with regular water, oils must be thinned with oil solvents such as mineral spirits. There's also laquers which are sort of a type of oil paint, but they're mostly specialized spray paints.

But yeah, weathering, like you're doing there on that big chrome section in the center, are almost universally done with washes. Very rarely in real life will you see weathering that is distinct brush-like strokes, it's almost always a more diffuse dirt. The exception are scuffs and such, will be a separate layer of weathering done after washing.

Here's a video that'll show some basic acrylic washing

Check out a lot of his videos, they're great resources.

That's exactly what I needed to see. Thanks, man. I started working on an Indy Denix Webley for my Indy set up. I wanted it to look beat up, Unsure if I went a tad too far. I didn't do the 'wash', I didn't know about that then, but I need to do a few more lacquer coats and then I'll share.

I'll post more as I work on them.

 

[Mythos Fenn]

Good tips so far! If you are going for barrel scorching I just prop my blaster up on end and lightly spray/mist some black spray paint to get that used blaster barrel look without getting the brush strokes - you can also use the sponge with minimal paint on it and just lightly dab it on. That method works well for adding scuff marks as well. I also talked with a guy that spray paints the whole prop silver first and then when he paints the full blaster after that he goes back with a kitchen scrubbing sponge and runs that over the parts he wants to make look like weathered metal. Once you are happy with the scuffing, just buff it with an old shirt and then clear coat it. I have copied that idea and been able to get some pretty good results!

 

[GermanRedrum]

Good tips so far! If you are going for barrel scorching I just prop my blaster up on end and lightly spray/mist some black spray paint to get that used blaster barrel look without getting the brush strokes - you can also use the sponge with minimal paint on it and just lightly dab it on. That method works well for adding scuff marks as well. I also talked with a guy that spray paints the whole prop silver first and then when he paints the full blaster after that he goes back with a kitchen scrubbing sponge and runs that over the parts he wants to make look like weathered metal. Once you are happy with the scuffing, just buff it with an old shirt and then clear coat it. I have copied that idea and been able to get some pretty good results!

As far as the top goes,and the gun, I wanted it to look HELLA beat up and carbon scoring. For what I was trying to do, I like the top part. The mistake I made was weathering it when it was apart. So it’s far from symmetrical on both sides.
Was more of a “What do I know so far” kind of project.

 

[Mythos Fenn]

Makes sense. That does make it tricky to get even if it's not all in one piece when you weather it. Keep it up though dude. Looks good as is and the more you try out techniques the better you will get.

 

[GermanRedrum]

Makes sense. That does make it tricky to get even if it's not all in one piece when you weather it. Keep it up though dude. Looks good as is and the more you try out techniques the better you will get.

Thanks. Lessons learned. I'm about to wrap up a Denix Webley for an Indy set up. I tried to make it looks pretty beat up. I'll post when done, as well as the Han ANH DL-44.

 

[GermanRedrum]

Oh yeah no problem. Pretty much the different thicknesses of paints you can get by thinning them can give all sorts of different effects, and there's a few sorta major categories of paint depending on how thin they are. Normal paints straight out of the pot, Brushable paints which are thinned slightly to brush on smoother, airbrushable paints which are thinned more significantly to go through an airbrush, and then wash paints which are thinned very significantly and used to weather stuff by being 'washed' over the whole piece then cleaned off.

There's also two major types of paint themselves, acrylics and oils. Acrylics can be thinned with regular water, oils must be thinned with oil solvents such as mineral spirits. There's also laquers which are sort of a type of oil paint, but they're mostly specialized spray paints.

But yeah, weathering, like you're doing there on that big chrome section in the center, are almost universally done with washes. Very rarely in real life will you see weathering that is distinct brush-like strokes, it's almost always a more diffuse dirt. The exception are scuffs and such, but those should be a separate layer of weathering done after washing.

Here's a video that'll show some basic acrylic washing

Check out a lot of his videos, they're great resources.

Ive seen most of them. I think I got a decent thinned out paint that goes on easily. It takes a couple coats but works.