Search the Community

Hey folks! Just going to pass along a quick technique that I use when I am not sure how well a color will work as a highlight or shade on a figure I am working on, I call it 'The Swatch Stick'. Basically, all it is is a craft stick, tongue depressor etc that has had a small hole drilled in one end to allow a paper clip to be put through it. The stick is then primed with whatever primer you use on your minis, I tend to use white P3 spray for over all coverage, and Reaper White brush on to fix things that I have had to file, scrape or putty after I have started painting. Here is an example that I made the other night with a tongue depressor while finishing up my Barbhast Devils: I was looking at what colors to use to highlight Scale 75 Old Copper (OC), Pure Copper (PC) and Victorian Brass (VB), each of which I painted on the primed stick straight from my palette, the same dilution I used on the minis. It took 2 coats of each.... I then painted a thin strip of Scale 75 Moonstone Alchemy on each color swatch, then a strip of Amber Alchemy. The 3rd strip on the Pure Copper is a 50% mix of Pure Copper and White Alchemy. Again, the strips were painted with paint from my palette. After everything is dry, you can now see which color you like better, or if you like it at all! There is space to try other colors as well.... (Please do not think that these are good representations of the paint colors used! The camera made a hash of the colors, but the idea behind the concept is still there) I guess you could paint each stick with one color, and test a lot of stuff with it if you like... But these are for me, pretty much one use things. After I use the Back side of that tongue depressor, it will get thrown away, since I will know which colors in this case, I want to / need to use. So give it a try! It just costs a couple spritzes of primer, a stick and some time! George PS I am about to use the back of this to test Reaper Pumpkin Orange against Polly S Goblin Flesh, and Scale 75 Kalahari Orange, and likely some other Oranges to find a good highlight for my Ral Partha Goblins!

So my old Winsor & Newton series 7 size 1 finally died. Last year (or possibly longer ago) there was some concern about US Fish and Wildlife importing regulations making kolinsky sable paint brushes much harder to find in the US. As a result, I bought some brands I hadn't tried to test out should trusty old Winsor and Newtons become unavailable. I've had good experience with Old Holland paints, so I decided to try their brushes too. Brush size has no standardization or consistency from brand to brand. Each picture below shows a new Old Holland Series 7001 Kolinsky Size 4 brush (above) and a new Winsor and Newton Series 7 Size 1 brush (below), and as you can see they are pretty much the same size. Before washing (as came from store): Washed, with centimeter scale: The Old Holland brush has a much longer handle and a thicker grip near the business end: Details of markings: I haven't tested them in painting yet, but while washing them they seemed to have about the same amount of "snap".