Intro: Painting in Acrylics

On a lighter note, I thought some of you might find peeking into the process of how I paint. I will always take photos of horses in-progress so I can study them larger than life on my computer screen. Sometimes its easier to see flaws or weirdness on the screen than in person, especially when painting minis since I can blow them up REALLY big to look at the details.

Its rare that I'll actually share photos of something before it is finished, since I know its hard for people to see how the horse will look complete when he is looking all weird and awful. And with that, I'd like to share with you this Dinky Duke. He was one of the in-progress pieces I had to put down last week, but found some time to fuss over him today since he really needs to go out. I'll share the finished pics tomorrow.

Intro: Painting with Acrylics

This is going to be a quick rundown of my process, but I will get more in-depth with it on a different piece (something larger and easier to see). My process is a bit different than how others paint I'm sure; half because I am using acrylics, half because I work from dark-to-light instead of the other way around. I start with base-coating the horse with one of the darkest shades I plan on using. Here, Dinky started out black since he is going to be seal bay.

Once his base-coat is dry, I start working over it in washes, moving the very lightest color next. The wash ratio I use is about 75% paint to 25% clean water. Since I mix the paints themselves with extender; there is no need to add more. Another note--the paints I mix have a higher concentration of pigment, so I can add the water and it doesn't make it too translucent. Even still, it takes several washes to make it opaque, and takes a long time to get it the right place.

Here you can see where I've started on the pangare. I have 3 washes on his right side, with no blending just yet. Another quirk of mine is that I work front-to-back. I start at the muzzle and work back to the tail. I even do this when customizing something; it helps me see where I've been and how far I still need to go. So, on this side, you can start to see a bit of blending down his neck.

Once I get the lightest values blocked out, I can blend in the middle values to create shading and depth of color. I've gotten a little farther on his left shoulder/neck.

Here you can see his finished face, before any coats of Krylon (this is why it still looks a bit streaky; that is caused by the different mixes/intensities of the paint layers). Once it gets sprayed with finish it will be completely smooth and even.



This dinky is going to be an appy. That, along with finished pics, will be tomorrow's entry!