10+ hours for 6 minis? What am I doing wrong?

[-Ice]

I've just finished 6 minis. No, wait, they aren't even finished yet, I still have to do the aquila, the purity seal, the metallic tubes, and then put on the bolters.

10+ hours for this work. What am I doing wrong?

I dilute my paints 1:1, and I did the basecoats in 4 coats. I work in an "assembly line" manner, doing one thing on each mini then moving on to the next.

I think my biggest time-waster is doing washes. It is so unpredictable that I'm thinking of doing away with it entirely. I wash my mini with 1:1 Dark Flesh and Varnish, and then add 8 parts of water (the previous 10 part dilution didn't "ink" the mini too much), but I get trouble with either there being too little color, or having "rings" on the mini once the water evaporates. So I end up "cleaning up" the mini with my basecoat mix.

I started working at around 1:00pm today with pre-primed minis, and only now have I finished with the "clean up" with the washes and the black areas that overrun.

I'm not feeling too good despite the work I've accomplised. :sad:

 

[Wicksy]

Its not a speed comp mate. It takes as long as it takes. You'll get quicker the more you paint but it shouldnt bother you with time taken. Unless you're working to some strict deadline.

 

[Torn blue sky]

Yeah I still paint painfully slowly.

 

[-Ice]

No, I'm not. I'm just surprised it takes this long for only 6 minis. SIX!

Then again, I'm not aiming for "speed painting" and I'm not doing display pieces either. I was just amazed at the time it took, and looking at the time:quality ratio, I think I'm not too pleased. Still, I have yet to paint the army... I dunno, I'm so confused.

Is this "normal" speed for your average painter? Even for the experienced ones, how long does it take you to paint a TTQ mini? Or, think back to your more "amateur" days, how long did it take you to make one then?

 

[gohkm]

Why the emphasis on speed? It's a slow burning sort of hobby.

I did a time test on Dragon Painting forums just this weekend, to answer your questions. 90 mins, how far can one get? Shooting for table top standard (basecoat, 2 washes, 2 highlights, limited blending), I nailed a Centurus Clone flesh fully complete with the abovementioned formula, and got the basecoat on its skirt done. And that's about it. I remember being how surprised I was to find that getting an even basecoat took the bulk of the time spent.

It's slow, I acknowledge, but painting that quickly took all the fun out of it. I very much prefer the slow painting times, gives me a lot of time to think and reflect and enjoy 'why the bloody hell is my brush fishtailing' and 'why is the paint splitting so quickly' moments. If you really want to compare further, I just finished a unit of 6 Dirz Keratis Warriors at table top standard - I spent every night for 5 weeks (Ok, work weeks - Mon to Fri, weekends belong to the garden), 2 hours, finishing them up completely, paint and base.

I've never had that much discipline finishing a unit before, but I really enjoyed it. I think I'll break out a full unit of 3 Dirz Tigers next. That'll do me another 3-4 weeks getting paint and sandy paste all over my fingers .

Just enjoy your slow painting. If you want to accelerate it, maybe it's time to start thinking of getting an airbrush for basecoats (or even coloured primer), and perhaps also looking at one of those Army Painter dip thingies.

 

[-Ice]

Erm, no, like I said, I'm not aiming for speed. Speed for me (at my skill level) = low quality work and I don't like that.

So I guess this is normal, eh? And I notice you say 2 washes. TWO?!?! Can you tell me where/when you apply them? I'm having trouble getting one wash to work properly as it is, and spent most of my time on cleanup!

 

[gohkm]

Sorry, my bad. Can't multitask, Ice .

2 washes in succession - I do controlled washes. Each one is a darker iteration, normally. Occasionally, I'll use the 2nd wash to shift the colour stain a bit. Let me explain: say I'm painting flesh. First wash consists of the flesh base colour and a bit of red - this goes into all the crevices I can find; I don't flood the fig with it, but using a damp brush, I paint the wash in until I'm satisfied with the level of staining.

Second wash is the flesh base colour and a bit of green. I do exactly the same, paint this carefully into all the crevices I can find.

If it's a very flat figure, I'll even do a third wash consisting of the flesh base colour, a bit of red, and a bit of green, BUT somewhat even more dilute than the above washes. Same thing, paint this really carefully into the crevices. This a very strong colour, so even a bit will stain the fig, but sometimes I get careless and override all the previous washes. Back to square one in this case ...

Or, to shift the colour spectrum, say, I'm painting metals. So I basecoat Boltgun Metal. I do this controlled wash thing first with some Ogryn Flesh. This gives it a dark red-brown stain. I want more of the red, so I use some slightly diluted Baal Red to do another controlled wash, hitting a smaller area I already covered with the Ogryn Flesh, but still on top of it. Does this make any sense? I will hit it again, this time in an even smaller area, with a bit of Leviathan Purple. Voila! I get a transition of red-brown to red, to purple in the recesses. Then, it's just a bit of clean-up with Boltgun Metal.

Perhaps you could think of it as reverse layering - instead of layering to highlight, I layer to shade.

What is the specific issue you're having with washes? They're quite easy to use, the trouble is that surface tension tends to create tidemarks when drying, and that's a real pain.

 

[freakinacage]

if it's taking 4 coats for just your base coat, i would say you are thinning too much. have you tried the p3 reds? very nice and great coverage. also you could try buying vehicle paint. some good reds available and CHEAP, not to mention hard wearing. prime, then spray your basecoat on. done a LOT quicker that way, then you can spend more time ont he highlights and shades. there things take time

 

[-Ice]

gohkm, what do you mean by "controlled washes"? Do you mean you just apply it on the recesses? My main problem with washes is the 1) "tidemarks" or rings that end up after the wash has dried and 2) the inconsistent results I get from a wash - sometimes its very dark sometimes there's barely any staining at all!

freak, I do believe that 2 coats on my dilution is enough. I use GW's Blood Red with 1:1 dilution and I think 2 coats will do fine. I just put more to be sure of even coverage... the fine work is then totally messed up by the unpredictable washes. Since I spend more time cleaning up than putting on details, I guess that's why I'm so frustrated

 

[Ritual]

Tidemarks mean you apply too much. What I think is meant by "controlled wash" is probably more like a glaze. You apply a small amount of diluted paint and drag it like a think film over the area you want to affect. A glaze is much easier to control than a wash, even if you reduce the amount of paint you apply in your wash. You will never be able to fully controll a wash.

 

[airhead]

It sounds like you are on the verge of a dip instead of a wash. i.e. coating the whole mini or the whole 'red' block with a dark red wash? The term dip comes from some 'nid painters using a wood stain to dip a mini in after it was base coated. Looks ok on some of the bugs and I've used it on skeletons (guessing it would work on the necrons?).

Ritual is talking about a different style of darkening the recesses where you don't flood the area with a wash, but instead paint a darker layer on with a thin glaze. Not flooding the area, but putting a wet layer on that will dry much quicker with the paint still thinned enough to be translucent.

There are lots of ways to skin this cat. I can do a skeleton army in 3-4 hours if I assembly line them. On the other hand, individual character minis can take weeks.

Read through the tutorials on layering, glazing and washes. If possible, spend some time painting with another experienced painter. I find my level of painting goes up every time I paint with someone better than me.

 

[Hendarion]

I'm just surprised it takes this long for only 6 minis. SIX!

Dude, I need 30h+ for a single mini. A single one. In a quality that some of the top-painters else could do in 5-10 hours.

 

[Noddwyr]

Dude, I need 30h+ for a single mini. A single one. In a quality that some of the top-painters else could do in 5-10 hours.

Me too. Though If I do standard TT I can do it much faster. THough 6 minis in 10 hours might still be beyond me.

 

[airhead]

I tend to get bogged down in the details.
Paint mini.
Wash mini.
Highlight mini.
Paint details.
Go back and repaint mini where I got paint from the details on the mini.
Go back and repaint details where I got base coat paint on them.

Find a mold line I missed.

Break out the x-acto to remove mold line.
Try to match paint in area scraped.....
Toss in the stripper.

 

[-Ice]

Me too. Though If I do standard TT I can do it much faster. THough 6 minis in 10 hours might still be beyond me.

Does that mean I'm faster than you or the other way around?

I'm glad at least this is the "norm" here. Being new to this hobby, I thought I could whip up an army in a weekend, even with my "higher-than-average TTQ standard."

I'll not comment on washes here as I've started a thread just for that, though I do appreciate all the advice on washes.

 

[Mourner]

No, I'm not. I'm just surprised it takes this long for only 6 minis. SIX!

I'veand I've finished one (and stripped two, one of them twice )
used my brushes on no more then 4-5 models this last YEAR!!

any display model (8+) takes me at least 100+ hours.
too many hours spend cleaning and converting, and way too many hours spend painting...

I have painted a couple real simple Imperial Guardsmen at TTQ... that took me about 6 hours for 10...
*clean and assemble
*prime grey
*basecoats (face, metal, armor parts)
*black wash over the entire mini (large brush, Badab Black, no water...)
*another black wash for all the cloth parts...
*highlight the armor
*highlight the face and paint eyes

decent enough quality for me to paint an army...
about on par with your marines, only problem is, i've had way more practice than you've had.
so you can congratulate yourself on painting pretty fast TTQ minis already
onto washes...
I've got two ways to apply a wash:

1st way, a general wash (washing a large area or an entire model)
i dilute my washes by loading them up with water, next, i take the wash straight out of the pot and see how much i can paint with what i got.
if it's too little, i repeat the previous step (as fast as i can, to get one entire uniform coat)
if it's too much, i unload the rest onto a piece of tissue paper and let the brush suck up the excess wash
you might want to watch the wash dry some time, and see if it needs any special attention...

2nd way, a controlled wash (only washing the shadows)
I take a fine brush, load up on wash (straight out of the pot) and simply paint any area i want the wash to go

well, that's it, keep painting

 

[IdofEntity]

Just painted 5 Dire Avengers from Eldar. Total time: 28h 25m

I'm just as frustrated as you over my painting speed/quality ratio, but I've been keeping tabs on my average mini speed since the beginning of this year. (I'm a numbers freak)

I've dropped an average of 19 minutes per mini, and witnessed a slight improvement in quality. I'm also using more thinned out coats and being far more exacting over my highlighting. You'll get better, but it's going to take time. Sorry I can't help you more, mate.

On a side note, it takes me almost 100 hours to finish an Eldar Grav Falcon.

 

[Noddwyr]

Does that mean I'm faster than you or the other way around?

I'm glad at least this is the "norm" here. Being new to this hobby, I thought I could whip up an army in a weekend, even with my "higher-than-average TTQ standard."

I'll not comment on washes here as I've started a thread just for that, though I do appreciate all the advice on washes.

It means you are probably faster than me. 6 minis in 10 hours is good. And as others have said you will get faster if you keep doing it.

 

[Chrome]

Does that mean I'm faster than you or the other way around?

I'm glad at least this is the "norm" here. Being new to this hobby, I thought I could whip up an army in a weekend, even with my "higher-than-average TTQ standard."

I'll not comment on washes here as I've started a thread just for that, though I do appreciate all the advice on washes.

I remember when Apocalypse came for 40k, I bought the Battle company and rushed it all so I could join in on the apoc game we were going to have the weekend after to celebrate. Over 110 marines "finished" in less than a week and I almost stopped playing after that. I got sick of marines and I got sick of the way they looked afterwards, I was ashamed of them and that almost killed my love of the whole hobby, it took me a year before I even touched a marine with the intention of modelling or painting. Yesterday I basecoated a mini, blocked out the two main colours and started lining and highlighting it, that took me five-ish hours and I loved it all the way, which is unusual since I'm no fan of painting. But the slower I paint and the more attention I give it, the more I enjoy it so I'm slowly getting there.

And there's what's important. Enjoying all the steps; if you don't you'll end up finding it a chore and you'll get bored of it. So let it take the time you need to have fun, it's still just a hobby.

 

[IdofEntity]

I remember when Apocalypse came for 40k, I bought the Battle company and rushed it all so I could join in on the apoc game we were going to have the weekend after to celebrate. Over 110 marines "finished" in less than a week and I almost stopped playing after that. I got sick of marines and I got sick of the way they looked afterwards, I was ashamed of them and that almost killed my love of the whole hobby, it took me a year before I even touched a marine with the intention of modelling or painting. Yesterday I basecoated a mini, blocked out the two main colours and started lining and highlighting it, that took me five-ish hours and I loved it all the way, which is unusual since I'm no fan of painting. But the slower I paint and the more attention I give it, the more I enjoy it so I'm slowly getting there.

And there's what's important. Enjoying all the steps; if you don't you'll end up finding it a chore and you'll get bored of it. So let it take the time you need to have fun, it's still just a hobby.

To be fair, you picked Space Marines. Vanilla Marines are just plain boring to look at. Only ones that even look remotely intriguing are Black Templar & Grey Knights.