jonfreeman Posted July 17, 2019 Share Posted July 17, 2019 so ... painting eyes is not an option for me. I have essential tremor, so unless the figure has larger eyes (as in: eyes that are at least a cm diameter) I won't have the hand-accuracy to make the eyes look like they're focusing on anything. For most male-mini-figs I can get away with washes/shading (this being because of their tendancy to have pronounced brows to cast a shadow). Female mini-figs rarely have a pronounced brow, so I can't really get away with grim-dark eye-shading there. So, core quest, for those case what are alternatives to painting in eyes? (in before it's posted, please don't provide a diagram of how to paint eyes and how easy it is. ^^; as stated, hand accuracy prevents that level of detail work) Cheers! 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doug Sundseth Posted July 17, 2019 Share Posted July 17, 2019 Some suggestions that might help: If you look at people from a distance where they look the same size as miniatures on a table, you can't "see the whites of their eyes". What you do see is the shadow of the eyebrow ridge over the eye socket. So you can just fill the eye socket with your skin shadow color and it generally reads pretty well on the table. If you can manage to paint the eyebrows, this will help sell the illusion. The simplest way to actually paint eyes that I know of is to paint a horizontal stripe of off-white in each eye socket, not worrying about keeping the color in the lines. Then paint a vertical stripe of the iris color, leaving just a bit of white at the corners. Then paint under and over the actual eye with the skin shadow color to cover the overpainting of the whites and iris. This limits the need for precision and works pretty well, depending on how bad the tremor is. I wouldn't worry about white dots or pupils; they're only really visible when you're using magnification. My wife has essential tremor as well. In her case, it's more of a large-muscle issue than a small-muscle issue. She has found that the way she holds the mini is pretty important in making precision both easier and more possible. Specifically, mount the mini on a reasonably long holder, then rest the heel of the paintbrush hand on the the holder while painting. This can reduce the effect of large-muscle tremor, since both hands will move together. The only muscles actually being used to paint are the thumb and one or two fingers on the painting hand. I hope at least one of those is useful for you. 5 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jonfreeman Posted July 17, 2019 Author Share Posted July 17, 2019 19 minutes ago, Doug Sundseth said: Some suggestions that might help: If you look at people from a distance where they look the same size as miniatures on a table, you can't "see the whites of their eyes". What you do see is the shadow of the eyebrow ridge over the eye socket. So you can just fill the eye socket with your skin shadow color and it generally reads pretty well on the table. If you can manage to paint the eyebrows, this will help sell the illusion. The simplest way to actually paint eyes that I know of is to paint a horizontal stripe of off-white in each eye socket, not worrying about keeping the color in the lines. Then paint a vertical stripe of the iris color, leaving just a bit of white at the corners. Then paint under and over the actual eye with the skin shadow color to cover the overpainting of the whites and iris. This limits the need for precision and works pretty well, depending on how bad the tremor is. I wouldn't worry about white dots or pupils; they're only really visible when you're using magnification. My wife has essential tremor as well. In her case, it's more of a large-muscle issue than a small-muscle issue. She has found that the way she holds the mini is pretty important in making precision both easier and more possible. Specifically, mount the mini on a reasonably long holder, then rest the heel of the paintbrush hand on the the holder while painting. This can reduce the effect of large-muscle tremor, since both hands will move together. The only muscles actually being used to paint are the thumb and one or two fingers on the painting hand. I hope at least one of those is useful for you. I'll give this a shot when I get back to the table. thanks ^__^ 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gadgetman! Posted July 17, 2019 Share Posted July 17, 2019 Ue a bright red colour for the eyes, and claim that it's a demon in disguise... Or yellow and claim it's a wizard/sorcerer/sorceress prepring to cast a spell. or green and it's a druid faffing about with nature... 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zink Posted July 17, 2019 Share Posted July 17, 2019 1 hour ago, Gadgetman! said: Ue a bright red colour for the eyes, and claim that it's a demon in disguise... Or yellow and claim it's a wizard/sorcerer/sorceress prepring to cast a spell. or green and it's a druid faffing about with nature... #1 is what I do for orcs and goblins. A bright light blue is for some spellcasters. Need to try Doug's advice myself. Depending on the detail of the model a lot of time I just put some darker wash in the sockets. I can barely paint nice eyes on models with well defined eyes. A lot of the historical minis I paint have sort of a squint that for me is impossible to make look like an eye. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glitterwolf Posted July 17, 2019 Share Posted July 17, 2019 I don't know if you can handle it to use a simple wooden skewer and place a point? If you can paint the eyeball an off white and then use the point of the skewer to place the pupil in one touch. If you're not able to do this, I agree on the demonic/magical eyes etc. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paintybeard Posted July 17, 2019 Share Posted July 17, 2019 I am gradually developing a hand tremor myself. Genetics catches up with us all in the end. I can still manage to paint the whites of eyes with reasonable results. But for the pupils I have taken to using a good quality indelible pen in order to achieve good positioning and consistent size. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ManvsMini Posted July 17, 2019 Share Posted July 17, 2019 5 hours ago, Doug Sundseth said: The simplest way to actually paint eyes that I know of is to paint a horizontal stripe of off-white in each eye socket, not worrying about keeping the color in the lines. Then paint a vertical stripe of the iris color, leaving just a bit of white at the corners. Then paint under and over the actual eye with the skin shadow color to cover the overpainting of the whites and iris. This limits the need for precision and works pretty well, depending on how bad the tremor is. I wouldn't worry about white dots or pupils; they're only really visible when you're using magnification. I have hand issues too Jon. While mine aren't tremor related, a version of this method Doug described is how I usually do my eyes. Paint my shadow color first, then off-white in the eye socket, then a vertical stripe for the eye. I start and finish my vertical stripe outside of the eye socket, you can be less precise this way. Then just tidy up the area outside of the eye with previous colors. An important note is that I paint the eyes first before the rest of the face. If you are having issues stabilizing your hand, I made a post earlier in the year about the holder I made to ease my own hand issues. I'll link to a post within that thread that has pictures on how I use the design to keep my hands steady. Perhaps it'll give you some ideas, or inspire your own design/custom mini holder. 7 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GlenP Posted July 19, 2019 Share Posted July 19, 2019 The vertical stripe method described is the go to method for those with less than perfect eyes and steady hands. However, there is a company called Archer Transfers which makes a variety of eyeball decals in various scales starting at 54mm and working up to 1/6. The eyes are standard and anime style. They also have tattoos and uniform insignia in various scales. Cheers, Glen 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Clearman Posted July 19, 2019 Share Posted July 19, 2019 4 minutes ago, GlenP said: The vertical stripe method described is the go to method for those with less than perfect eyes and steady hands. However, there is a company called Archer Transfers which makes a variety of eyeball decals in various scales starting at 54mm and working up to 1/6. The eyes are standard and anime style. They also have tattoos and uniform insignia in various scales. Cheers, Glen The decal approach is what I've seen most garage kits use. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rigel Posted July 30, 2019 Share Posted July 30, 2019 On 7/17/2019 at 2:52 PM, Glitterwolf said: I don't know if you can handle it to use a simple wooden skewer and place a point? If you can paint the eyeball an off white and then use the point of the skewer to place the pupil in one touch. If you're not able to do this, I agree on the demonic/magical eyes etc. In theory, you might be able to get a large vise or clamp, masking-tape a mini to one end, align and attach a toothpick / skewer / ultrafine brush to the other end, and bring them together steadily that way. IN THEORY. I haven't tried this myself, can't stress that enough. But I can envision it working. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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