 Hello everybody and welcome to another hobby cheating video and today is going to be something especially for you if you're just beginning. Let's say you just bought your first big box of miniatures. Maybe you went out and got a starter box like this. Maybe you saw a kit you really loved. Maybe it's a board game. But at any rate you've decided you want to get into miniature painting. You've got the minis but now the question is what do you do? What do you buy? This video is going to walk you through the first six months of your purchases in miniature painting. So let's get into it. The strict technomancer that is Vinci V. Let us get into the technique and learn it Vinci. So as we begin a little note everything I'm going to talk about I have a link to down in the description. Now most of those links will be to Amazon but you don't need to purchase them. The ones I'm linking are not anything special or magical or the exact ones. I just wanted to make sure you had a real example of what this thing is I'm talking about. If you don't want to shop at Amazon, hey I understand that. You can also go to eBay or you can go to your local stores or anywhere you can find this stuff and that's fine. I just wanted to make sure you could see exactly what I mean so there was no confusion. All right so where do we start? We start with some of the simple tools you're going to need. The first thing you need to pick up is a hobby knife. This is sometimes thought of as an exacto blade or whatever the case. Now here comes my first recommendation. When you go to the hobby store you're going to see all sorts of these little five packs of blades or a hobby knife or something like that available and they're going to be pretty expensive. My advice don't buy those okay. Instead go on to Amazon or something like that uh eBay whatever and you can find medical grade scalpels in size 11 effectively the same as what we use and you can buy those in bulk incredibly cheap so you can get a hundred or so exacto blades as well as the little you know holder for them to handle as it were usually for around eight to ten dollars. It's going to set you up for basically ever and you'll spend much less than you would for something of lower quality or equal quality from the hobby store and that sort of leads to one of my first points. The hobby store is a great resource but all of your local stores your local arts and craft store your local hardware store that's often going to be a better resource because when products are made specifically for the hobby they're often more expensive so make sure you're hitting up those other local retailers because they might have the same products at a much cheaper price. Alright the next thing you're going to need is some clippers. Now my recommendation is again don't go to the hobby store you can get them there but they're going to be way more expensive don't go out and buy your Tamiya godhand right away don't spend fifty dollars on these that's all ridiculous go to the hardware store and find a flush flat back clipper so the key being it has to have a flat side on it to make a clean cut against the sprue when you're cutting you can usually find these at the hardware store for just a couple dollars most of the time they're going to be plenty durable they're going to be uh plenty tough and they'll be a heck of a lot cheaper and that initial set of clippers is going to last you for a long long time you've got your clippers you've clipped things out you've scraped them but you got to assemble them now a lot of kits like this easy to build they don't actually require glue but it's something you're going to need now again there are many different options on the market and there's lots of things over time that i'd recommend investing in but let's keep it simple and that is to say simple old zappa gap ca glue that kind of super glue is really all you need to start out and then eventually you can look at plastic glues or stuff like that but a good ca glue or super glue i'll get linked below it's really all you need now we've got a big question paints we've got to get some paint for these guys but what do we buy oh my goodness the options are overwhelming well first we got to start with primer right before we can actually put paint on we've got to have primer now somewhere down the line spoilers for the end of this video we're going to talk about an airbrush but that's not yet this is month one of you hobbying so we got to keep it simple that means rattle cans rattle cans are a perfectly acceptable primer they're what i use when i started out for probably the first six months nothing wrong with them at all now again you can use rattle cans from some game producer from citadel you say games workshop or from army painter or anything like that but if you really like paying three times the amount for the exact same product with a different label go for it i would say that you've got two options i would recommend and again i'm going to send you to your local stores option one you go to the hardware store they got a big old row of spray cans get yourself a good flat black make sure it's nice or make sure it's sort of a flat not a satin or glossy black or something like that jobs are good you can also buy colored versions of it if you're wanting to do like let's say you're doing mostly ultramarines great go buy a blue primer right why not or if you're doing mostly uh something like the storm cast and you're going to put them make them all white uh because you're using the um you know whatever color scheme that is celestial vindicators i don't know it doesn't matter sure then buy like a light gray right something like that that's option one you can find rattle can primers obviously at your store your hardware store for a few dollars the other option is you can go to your local art store your art store has sort of artist quality spray paint this is what you see a lot of people using maybe in those videos on facebook or for spray can art it's a few dollars more usually something like six to eight dollars us if you're here but still far cheaper than those branded game rattle cans and those are actually quite a bit higher quality and they have switchable tips so you can actually get like tips that spray and tighter uh spray patterns so they're kind of cooler to use now we've got things primed we actually have to paint them and again oh boy are there so many options so what do we buy well there's lots of different paints out there on the market and here's the big secret almost all of them made for the miniature hobby so all the miniature painting paints the ones that are branded from a company specifically to paint miniatures they're all mostly the same there are some differences there are some differences in how well they base code or how well they glaze or you know all those sorts of things it's not that there's no difference there is and it matters but it generally only matters down the line once you actually become experienced in all the techniques of miniature paint so where do you begin well my recommendation is sadly not starting with games workshop they have little flip tops their pots only come into 12 milliliters they're more expensive price per milliliter than any almost any other paint on the market they're annoying they dry out i just i wouldn't recommend it now that being said something like their shade line can be really useful for washes at the beginning so i would recommend you pick up a couple of those like an agrax earth shade or a wrightland flesh shade but for your actual paints the mainline paints you're going to be putting on the miniatures my answer here is pretty simple good old vallejo model color vallejo makes two starter sets one for model color and one for game color both of them are fine they're relatively inexpensive again they can be ordered on amazon i'll link it below so you see what i'm talking about but you can also find them in stores lots of stores even game stores carry these it really does come with a pretty wide range of colors most of what you're going to need to get started you don't need to go out and buy 200 paints to get miniature painting i see a lot of people just jump in feet first like they're just into the middle of the ocean and it's just overwhelming you can certainly expand your paint range over time you can buy paints slowly pick colors that you like and so on alternatives if you're not a vallejo fan or for some reason it's not available near you that's another advantage of it it is available almost everywhere in the world uh pro acrylic i really like pro acrylic it's from it's jason craze from monument hobbies it's a really great paint set it's very beginner friendly it's a wonderful paint set they do have starter sets available so you can check that out i'll link their website and then finally ak interactive third gen it was really made to be sort of a new formulation kind of and matched to vallejo colors there are also starter sets of that available that's another good one i really like those paints they're quite well formulated they cover well they don't really break down easy things like they're white are actually good it's not just crap one of the things you'll find as you get into miniature painting is that most companies white is pretty garbage but ak interactive has a good uh white color which is we've got paint then we're also going to need brushes this is another place i see people get confused because yet again there are a lot of brushes on the market so where do we begin well we keep it simple as always when it comes to synthetic brushes which is what you're going to want to start out for the majority of your brushes you're just going to buy big packs you're not going to worry about don't overspend money on synthetics synthetics curl they dry they have a short lifespan when working with acrylic paints they will not last i really cannot impress this upon you enough you will ruin these brushes often quickly so your goal is to get a lot of them relatively cheaply i'm going to link a brush pack down below i happen to like but you can find these multi brush packs of synthetics all over the place again hit your local art store you'll see them they're fine buy a couple of them they're usually only five or six bucks see which ones you like experiment right it's it's this is a good way to go and then when you use them and they die and the tip curls and they become horrible throw them in the trash now when it comes to nice brushes a good sable brush in a size one is a decent investment there are a couple places that have these sable brushes i like they will make a difference in your painting because they do make paint easier to control but you do not use them for everything your nice sable brushes are about specific tasks okay they are about doing detail work or eyes or final highlights or things like that where you need precise control with your brush so please don't use these expensive brushes everywhere again i'll link uh one down below i prefer the rafael 8404s they are hard to find winds are a newton series seven can also be a good one and yet again monument hobbies and jason craze has a really great set of sable brushes that are actually really nice and frankly way more affordable than anything else on the market that's made from artist brushes the final brush type we need is dry brushes dry brushes are really important and most people when they start out by these little flat crappy dry brushes and guess what they're actually truly horrible they're bad at that task and if you're buying something from a manufacturer like games workshop well then you're overpaying for a bad product so that's a double lose nobody likes a double lose so what do we do instead well the key there is makeup brushes yes big packs of cheap makeup brushes again amazon ebay the dollar store is your friend these are brushes meant for putting on blush or eyeshadow or those kinds of things and they're super soft and they're fantastic dry brushes they will work much better than any of those long flat dry brushes that you buy and pay too much money for from a game manufacturer and you can clean them really easy but if they do break down or die who cares you toss the trash you can usually get five ten fifty of them depending on how big you're buying them uh for again less than ten final thing you need to start to start this is your month one cost of entry items a good light now a lot of people don't think about this but it is really important a good light is critical to painting good lights can be many different things you can get something like architect or drafting lights like i have all sorts of setups but i wouldn't recommend those to start to start all you need is a good desk lamp or something like that something that can hold a light bulb and sit on your desk in a reasonable way could be a little clampy thing could be a traditional desk lamp i know ikea has a little clamp on desk lamps people really like fine you want it so it's kind of adjustable and then you want to get a daylight balanced bulb usually in 5000 to 5500k okay that's what you want something with that nice clean clear daylight balanced light you want a bright light painting tiny details is hard on your eyes and if you have to strain your eyes to paint you will find you paint less and you paint less well the final stuff is what i call free stuff it's not actually free but it's sort of close enough you need some kind of cup to put water in an old mason jar a red solo cup whatever some kind of cup to put water in because you're going to need to rinse your brushes so get that i don't know find a cup in your house it's not hard and then water pretty close to free the other item you need is kitchen roll or paper towel it has lots of different names but you need some sheets of paper towel it needs to be by you at all times one of the keys to painting is that you don't ever take your paint from the palette that you're working on dip your brush in it and then go directly to the miniature that's a good way to have your miniature get flooded with paint have paint out of control you want a little paper towel next to your your painting area that you touch into the paint and then you touch the paper towel and then you paint a miniature just that small change in your painting routine will dramatically improve your experience while painting and it's such a small simple thing we just wick away the excess first we always wick away the excess simple and easy three months in here we go so now we're at the three month mark we've been painting we're starting to understand this what's our next investment in the hobby well there's sort of two things i would recommend the first thing is varnish get yourself some varnish now my preference is for either ak interactive or mig ultra matte varnish again linked below one of the biggest problems i see newer painters have when they paint is that they use a lot of different paints and it has a lot of different finishes their miniatures look super glossy and weird because the light is reflecting in bad places and it just makes it look amateurish and and bad frankly i don't know how to say it makes it look bad that's basically it a good varnish that you can brush on and by the way this is completely brushable or air brushable as we see later is what i prefer and yes you can get rattle can stuff so like testers dull coat is a pretty popular one out there on the market but that rattle can varnish smells really bad you have to go outside to varnish and it you always risk it frosting frosting is when you spray the varnish there's a little too much humidity some of that humidity gets trapped in the varnish and then it frosts over and ruins your whole paint job not a great day not a great day uh so instead if you don't have an air brush i prefer to just use something like ak interactive it's fully brush on a bowl get yourself an old brush old brush do not use a nice brush your warning do not use a nice brush and you just brush on some of that ultra matte varnish and boom it'll even out the finish of everything and your miniature will look way better the wet palette is your next investment again there are several on the market but you don't need to do nuts you can make your own with a simple ziplock container a sponge and some some reynolds non wax baking paper that's pretty easy i have a video on this i will link my video on wet palettes up there but you can also just go again to your local art store or to amazon or something like that and buy a masterson wet palette it's the classic one it's fine my one piece of advice with the masterson it comes with some artist grade wet palette paper immediately take that and throw that in the trash it is not for us that is for acrylic artists that are using big heavy body acrylics and painting on canvas and they're trying to keep that wet it is a very different paper it has a very different level of osmosis it is not good for miniature paints you throw that paper in the trash you get yourself some reynolds baking paper or whatever the equivalent is in your country like non wax baking paper the thing you used to like you know make cookies or something and you cut us piece of that out and you put it on the palette all you need here's a fun tip for your wet palette when you have that wet palette put a little piece of copper wire in there or maybe a couple pennies on the corner uh something like that it that it's antimicrobial and it helps avoid your palette getting stinky and getting mold in it now we're six months in okay what's our sort of final hobby purchase on the trajectory of our journey at six months our final purchase is going to be an airbrush i know that might sound crazy this is the most expensive thing i'm going to recommend and that's why i say you wait till six months to do it make sure this hobby is going to stick and it's something you want to invest in a good airbrush setup is generally pretty cheap it's only about a hundred dollars it's cheaper than i just say buying even half the figs that you're you might need for your army uh might cost about the same amount or more and it is invaluable an airbrush lets you prime any time of year in any weather prime things quickly it lets you establish base coats in different colors fast it lets you blend things smoothly the high end on an airbrush is incredibly vast and it's a skill that you need to work just like anything else investing in an airbrush will really make your life so much better so much simpler in the hobby so much more enjoyable it is truly the best hobby purchase i ever made don't necessarily need a whole bunch of stuff i will link a video that i have it's very old but still valuable if i'll just buy an airbrush where i really go into detail on it for all the different ancillary products you can use but really all you need is the airbrush the hose and then the the uh the thing that makes air the compressor there we go that word would not come to my head uh and you're good to go a good sort of what are they called masters like g22 or g23 i will link the starter kit that's what i started with i used it for a good six months and i loved it it made priming and painting my big monsters and stuff like that and priming my regular figures so much easier it opens the door to things like zenithal highlighting video up above and it just is going to be a game changer for your hobby i hope this video was helpful to you if you're just starting out of the hobby i've been painting for 23 years now i've been doing it pseudo professionally i guess i don't know what that means for the last eight it is a hobby that gives me endless joy i love doing this i love sharing this hobby with people and i hope this gives you an idea of how you can get going with the hobby without breaking your wallet i like to highlight here is those things that i think are essential to get started for your six months in the hobby so if you like to this give it a like subscribe we have new hobby cheating here every saturday if you've got questions about anything i said drop those down below i always answer every comment but i thank you so much for watching this one and we'll see you next time