 Hello everybody and welcome to another PMP end of month review. Well, what is this? Well, this is where we sit down and we go through all of these submissions that have been put into the painters motivating painters Facebook group and we review All of them for this month Giving feedback as we can specifically where it's been asked if you'd like to join us on your hobby journey Well the link for the PMP it's right down below and you can certainly find that you have to answer all of the questions To get in the group all three questions. Otherwise, you don't get in This month's theme is units So we're only going to be looking at units of models Usually for an army, but it might not be it could be the whole force if we're talking about a skirmish game And we're going to be breaking down what these people are going for trying to offer the best advice we can remember as always to post a nice simple request for critique, uh, don't write me a novel, uh, just What you've got what you're looking for and how I can help That's what we're here for remember, uh, the PMP is about being positive and offering positive feedback Critique and helping you take your next step on your hobby journey. So with that, let's get into the actual review here Okay, so let me scoot this way a little bit. All right, there we go. So, uh, first off We've got some orcs here from peter Who says he was going for a couple different types of contrast So, uh, my answer, uh, peter is these are nice, uh, the older blood bolt orcs that they're they're a good tabletop standard We do still need to continue the contrast journey. Um, one thing I'll say about using green and red contrast is that you have to be careful You don't want to use the saturated versions of of both colors So one of the things you could do here to push the contrast is actually increase your yellow So bringing in a yellow tone or yellow mix with a flesh tone or something like that as a highlight to both the Red and to the green that will bring the two colors together make them feel as though they're standing within the same light But it'll also help desaturate both tones and make it so they're not quite as Uh, not quite as clashing because red and green if you use the saturated versions of both color just end up looking like Christmas So it does contrast but not really in a positive way, especially when you're going for rough and tumble football works The biggest chance I see for opportunity improvement is things like contrast Uh on the metal which is quite flat And then things like the leather boots. I can see you pushing the skin We've got to push it a lot farther as well as integrating contrast of hue Through things like maybe some additional colors in the lips or the skin pinks things like that Those also help not only add life through blood beneath the skin, but also help to desaturate the Green tone as well. So there you go. Peter. Hope that helps Okay, next up. We've got josh, uh with it. He says, you know painted these up to a tabletop standard And he's got all of his giants. Well, certainly cool. Uh, love the idea that you get him done You know, I think the biggest thing I would recommend is to add a little more You know, like again, it's going to be a contrast story things like their hair Especially on the skin. These guys are mostly skin. And so there's a lot of space to play there, right? Glazing in some soft tones doesn't necessarily take a long time But adding in when we're talking about skins, which I especially if we're doing with Caucasian skin tones is what you favorite here You know adding in things like Soft tones of magenta's purples crimson's browns that kind of stuff You can even get out the rakeland flesh shade and use it as a controlled glaze as opposed to a wash And I think that's going to go a long way I see you've got some of it on their kneecaps. I like that I want to see more of that around things like the pecs and the arms and the elbows and The joints and things like that and the fingers and really really push those highlights on the face Where we've got the most opportunity for, uh, increase of contrast is especially around the face, but I think for, uh, You know a tabletop army that you got together seemingly from the your your, uh Your text pretty fast. I think these came out great. I think they look really nice So I hope they go, uh, smash some people. Well done Okay, next up we've got Silas, uh, living dead Any opinions on the basing color palette or the non-metallic metal? Sure. So with non-metallic on undead, it's a little tricky because you need to also integrate other colors of rust and weathering Um, I may do a video on that sometime. I actually don't have anything on specifically doing non-metallic with rust effects But uh, it's something that you'll want to think about my guess is one hidalgo is going to have a tutorial on it Very soon given what I just saw. I'm posting online Um, I think that the spear tip is probably the one that sells me the most Uh, maybe the guy's sword in the back. Some of them are kind of flat like the mace and the guy's hand doesn't Is just kind of flat gray same with a lot of their shields Uh, as far as the skin tone goes on these guys, I think that's actually what I really like I like the skin on the dead guys that's you know, we've integrated some nice green tones There's still reds around stuff like that. So that's actually the part that sells me Overall nice job. Uh, I think they look real cool Keep pushing the contrast on the non-metallic metal smooth out those blends when you get to these things like shields You want to make sure you got those edges popped out and the trick with rusting this kind of non-metallic Is that you then take your shadows and that's where you work the rust in to make it stand as a contrasting element So instead of just going into the dark part It's then going to have browns oranges things like that worked in in the normal Way that you would figure in weathering Okay Uh, oh, yeah, she would also ask about the basing in the freehand. I apologize. Um, I think the basing's fine Um, be careful with just like rock elements like this They look boring when they're just gray as always rocks are never gray rocks always have color browns purples reds everything that occurs in nature Uh, and then as far as the freehand goes, um, you want to make sure whenever you're doing freehand You get a nice solid color. I can still see the color underneath one of the keys to good freehand is a nice solid thick Base coat you want it to be applied applied cleanly strongly and show no trace of the color underneath Because in reality if you were to like if this were being enameled on the shield It would not be showing any of it through because you would not be doing freehand with acrylics on something of this size So there you go Okay, next up t-bo bad guys from the witches Sabbath Uh, you're basically looking for any feedback. I'll be honest with you t-bo. I'm These are very strange miniatures and it's really hard to nail it down Um, like they're all just kind of swoopy loopy Things just piles of things they don't have a lot of These kind of figures always drive me crazy because I don't know what I'm supposed to be looking at and that makes it a real Challenge to paint because you need to control where my eye is going and it's really just this chaotic Situation so I'm not blaming you for the sculpt I think this guy's probably the cleanest one because at least I can kind of tell what's even going on here Um, a couple things I would say is you want to think about not using standardized recipes for stuff What I can see here is oh, we got to skulls. Okay, we painted in white and then we applied the wash And we got to wood. We did the wood color We you know, like everything feels very paint by the numbers and they're not Living in that none of this lives in the same world like this stone is completely gray And then these bones are completely warm and they look very contrasting and strange sitting next to each other in an Unhelpful way. So like, you know highlighting these back up doing them in the same cold Uh gray as the stone would have been a great touch, right because then they still could have had some brown shadows Uh, we could have also worked reds and browns into the shadows of the rock But had you know different volumes flying around there one was still read as rocks one would have read as skulls And that would have helped it stand apart As far as with models like this go, it's really hard to say. I mean, I couldn't even tell you like What is this guy's head? Versus an arm. I don't know what this is again not on you. I just I really don't like these figs Um, so it makes it very hard to evaluate. I'll say overall we need more contrast It's going to be a common story. You're going to hear me say a hundred times in this video. Um The wood needs more contrast the metal the The skin here all that. Um, I what does stand out to me is the vertigris work on the copper I think that looks really nice. You mixed in a couple different green tones there. You didn't just go for a single one I really like that it create you created a nice variance there. I think that really sells me So I do like that a lot too, but well done on that So, uh, I hope that helps All right, uh, michael, uh, these are the edo models from the two player starter bishito Uh, wanted violet to be his factions main color, but tried to paint each miniature in his or her own scheme Any feedback on creating a faction identity by keeping individual models distinct from each other? Yeah, sure So my answer is I think you did that. Uh, I think you nailed it in like exactly the way I would have said pick one Dominant color and have that show up in every miniature Uh, so I have no problem with that like you're I think you did it and executed on it in exactly the right way Like they all feel like they begin in the same group because they all have this dominant purple Item here. Uh, so that that sells me. I'm okay with that Um, you know, just other feedback again, probably just the contrast comment But I really quite like that a little nom the the nom metallic execution on like this guy's blades You put the highlight in the middle always makes it look good. Uh, I like the snake So and and your purple is very rich You could probably add a little flesh tone to make that appear more silky Like use a use a sunny skin tone or something as a highlight that's going to make purple feel really silky And uh, and like it has a real sheen to it Uh, so yeah, but other than that good stuff. I like what you did here and I think you you've unified them well Okay, next up necron warriors Let's actually look at this picture because this is going to be the one that sort of shows it off the best So I was like a fun concept army like this where we've got kind of this, you know bright Two-tone scheme basically right? One thing I think you really want to do when you when you do this kind of thing is I think it's cool to to have this kind of scheme But you need to make sure the individual elements are still then really strongly picked out What I mean here is make sure you have strong black lines If you're going to go for this in between the individual elements of the necron So for example in between his elbow joints here on his hand All of this stuff in between his fingers and the leg joints Those need to be really solid and black when you're going for this kind of striking almost comic book or or cyberpunk inspired theme this This neon scheme You want to make sure you still have some highlights? So like I would pop some of the blue up a little more It needs to come to a brighter more kick and highlight To to stand out against you know to have some fight with the pink because right now the pink is just dominating the blue But at the same time you also want to make sure that every panel line and everything that gets really dark To make those brights really stand out and show the full weight of their contrast And then mixing elements from top to bottom So for example the where you mix the pink into the blue here on the gun I think really works But we need a little more blue up top and a little more pink down at the bottom again We can keep it small So for example if we had some pink tufts on the base if they had bright blue eyes Right stuff like that could go a long way because then it kind of mixes it up a little bit Think of the difference between it's like yin yang, right? You have to have a little bit of dark in the light and a little bit of light in the dark And and that's what keeps everything looking in balance if it was just the white against black It would be a much more boring image. So uh, there you go. Hope that helps james Okay, next up we've got uh christian Super quick paint job for his endometous necrons a lot of necrons So i'm happy that i'm going to get to say necrons and drive everybody insane In this month's review Happy with how they turned out he's going for a heavy weathering scheme and so on how could we push it a little bit further Yeah, I mean they look heavily weathered and old and rusted and crusted One of the ways we could do is try to pop them out a little more with maybe some additional hits of stipple and color We could do that with both some stippling of black, especially down on the shadows to take control of the light We could even do a uh, uh sort of anti zenithal or na na na natural Whatever highlight shoot a dark color up from below the miniature doesn't matter Like you could take some panes gray beneath the miniature and create a nice universal shadow You could also stipple on a little orange here and there around the edges Like think uh the edges of joints or the edge of their shoulder plates or stuff like that Just to show where things have really heavily rusted And that will have two effects one. It'll make it pop out a little more It'll create more bright areas of interest more visual confusion that'll keep your eye moving around the miniature But it'll also Help to just break up the lot of brown, right? The only other place that really jumped out at me was possible You know when you're talking about taking things up to another level would probably be like big blades Like what the two lord guy here is is carrying Stuff like that is always a great opportunity to really punch in some color and have it look cool You know they they may be rusty and crusty, but their weapons are still ready to go and go make some Paste out of some space marine. So stuff like that's a good chance to really, you know Pop that blade way out it'll become an area of great visual interest and for a tabletop army It can really make the whole thing Stand out. So there you go. Hope that helps christian Okay, next up we have powell who brought us this wonderful warband and was looking about his thoughts on the osl uh any other tips and then I think he did a good a really good job on this warband. I want to say that out of the gate They look nice. They're very colorful. I like all the little the little touches of freehand like the mushroom on the bottle you know for his juice and stuff like the Images on the cloaks and stuff like that. I think that looks good But let's get over here to czar bag because we want to talk about the osl itself. That was your main area of question My answer is yes. I think it works I think we might want to have if you put a little bit of a dark line right in there kind of right around the inner thing Um, so there's a little bit of a separation just a nice thin not black Just darker line here around the bottom edge of the thing You also want to thin out the light that's around it like there's a little too much of an edge here Where too much light is spilling out of this very hard way. It should just be like the very edge Should carry a little bit of light and nothing else now as to the extension of the light I think it looks really nice. Uh, love the two-tone reflection in his big giant eyeball I think you crept the blue out really nicely onto the wool Uh, hoodies wearing. I really like the way that you we did some cross stitching for The texture of that. I think it carries out of the mushrooms here really well I like how you took it down into a nice purple shadow and up on his fingers Um, one thing you'll do want to think about is also then incorporating some deeper shadows So for example here between his fingers those shadows should be really really dark Okay, like I'm under a light right now. You see how dark that line gets between my fingers Right, that's what you want to have there, right? So, um, but yeah, I think the osl's you know, it sells We just need to increase the shadow part of it. Your lighting is really good has a really nice area of effect This this came out great. You did a wonderful job with it. They're very fun Um, they have a whole heck of a lot of personality. Great job Okay, next up tj Uh pink horrors down to some homebrew dnd demons Uh And he says, you know looking for opinions on how you could done these better put a lot of effort into them So be gentle. Well, sure. Absolutely. I'm not going to beat you up. I promise Um, they look really nice. I love the idea of using them for the descent to Avernus game Fun demons that well, I don't I don't use miniatures in my dnd game as I've said many times, but that's a great campaign It's a lot of fun. So I love that you're playing through it. And if you guys use minis Hey, it's dnd getting played. That's never a bad thing Now onto these guys, uh, my answer is a little more contrast is really the way to go here So how could we punch them up a little bit? Well, we'd take that red and we'd really add some more highlight use something like a medium skin tone Or a sunny skin tone or something like that and just kind of pop up those ridges Especially around their face in this area Here on the tops of the ridges the thing around their head very tops their muscles That kind of thing makes a little bit of that into your into your red You're using your red orange or just put it on there and then do a glaze of the red orange over top Both are perfectly fine Like the green that the osls may be a little strong in how far it's carrying down things like this guy's arm You want to be careful with that like it's it's carrying down light to here But then there's no light here, you know that kind of stuff you'd be better with a softer glow softer glows generally excel better because This is how much light would be like the the light aura just doesn't make sense there given the other light you've painted right if I I keep this near me now just to do this here's my here's me How much light did that just make? none Because i'm sitting in like an extremely bright room All right, like it has a very small radius of what it casts Because i'm sitting in this bright area and you've painted the highlights on them as though they have a bright light above them So you want to like these guys with their shadows under their arms you can really see it the dudes you're up like this so Can you carry out that normal contrast wheel back on the osl? I think you got a good good look there, but overall these guys look really good man like the bases They look fun good use of color good choices there purple tongues really stand out excellent choice to draw attention to the face well done Okay, next up we have houston batch 10 blade guys revenants how I can improve the overall ghost aesthetic sure actually So let me know to tell you the first thing I noticed about this The one way you can get a really good check on the ghost aesthetic a couple different options So first things first is we don't have enough of Sort of a color interest here So you can do it like on the spectral part of them you went too dark. It feels basically like the cloth So you got two choices You could make the white actually start here beneath the cloth Then you get this real hard contrast and then you just take it out to a very light glazed version of the color Down at the end of it. So you leave the the spectral part being the nearest part to the The white part being the nearest part to the actual cloth The other option is you brighten it way up. You still make it like a blue green or sorry a blue white or something near the actual Uh, the the cloth part itself But then you take it into that ghostly white in this nice soft long transition Do the same thing at the arms like right whatever you did down on the ghostly parts at the bottom here You do the same thing up on the arms So again working those soft glazes of that kind of spectral color could be any of the sort of you know ghostly colors Gw offers or it could just be any old, you know light green or light blue Uh, you know glaze because it's going to give that same feeling The other thing I would say is things like their weapons and their chains look really clean and fresh If they're ghosts, you want them to look dead you want them to look a little old So some steps like some weathering some rust some vertigree those kinds of things are going to go a long way To make them feel more like spirits That have been condemned rather than just you know fresh off the factory line people who are picking up some really shiny New weapons and wearing brand new spiffy robes. They just got back from the dry cleaners, right? So there you go. Hope that helps Okay, next up joshua very simple ask here on Basically like he wants to have this sort of jade look here on the helmet so my answer is uh Because that's really the main area the feedback My answer is you want to stipple in a couple different colors when you're doing jade You lay lay it down like a nice dark jade color Maybe actually something called jade on the bottle like Vallejo, right? Then we're going to stipple in a couple lighter colors mix in some blue green do a little stippling sharp brush Stipple stipple stipple put a couple things in lines Like don't just stipple dots also stipple in little lines or something like that Bring it across then go to then mix in a little white do this repeat the same exercise Then do some pure white very minimal exercise again random patterns all the time Then you're going to take that original jade you're going to glaze back over it nice and thin What that's going to give is that transparent layered effect because all there's going to be little criss-crossing areas Patterns that you've organically created through the random stippling and when you lay a glaze or two over that It's going to create that effect you're looking for I actually have an old video on this if you want to go back and check it out Boy did I do it a long time ago But I think it was called how to paint marble the first one I did on how to paint marble Um, I actually do it as jade using almost the colors. I just described So if you check that out that that'll give you some good direction there. Okay Hope that helps josh All right next up michael Uh looking for feedback in general He's not the highest quality managers, but wanted to do a real-time investment any general feedback is appreciated I won't bust you on the basis because you said you're still thinking about that. Yeah, I think these guys look nice I like that you did a little different color on each of the turtles for their green skin I think we could push some of the highlights up on any everybody except uh raff donatello needs to have more shadows So he goes way too far from one Five right as usual one when I talk about this in contrast of value One is your brightest color five is your Darkest color three is your midtone in the middle and so then the other two are half steps I recently did a video called understanding contrast. I would recommend everybody go watch that If you have questions because I'm going to say you need more contrast repeatedly in this video a lot and Like go watch that video that will get you on the right road One thing that I noticed is that all their there are strappy straps like all the white straps They had are very boring and flat and white all the way around they need some tone some color They should have some gray shadow to them, right? This is my white shirt This is white. Look at this color. Look at what color. This is under a white light. Does that look white to you? All right This how about I cover that up? What color is that shirt? all right Okay, the point is is that like even very bright white things tend to be very susceptible to shadows So you want to integrate those gray tones those blue gray tones to create shadows on that's actually the part I noticed that jumped out the most I didn't mind the like I like the contrast on the turtle skin a lot of their their actual masks and stuff look fine but the the Wrappings or whatever their little ninja wraps Felt pretty boring and flat. So that was actually the biggest thing that jumped out of me I hope that helps and as always turtle power Okay All right next up alan Two minutes of dwarfs for his fantasy army from the skull pass box super classic dwarfs Uh, basically looking for general feedback and then you know, he did some subtle osl and glazes and stuff like that Yeah, so these guys look good. Um nice clean execution You're you've got a really steady hand a confident hand with the paintbrush. I appreciate that Uh, I think the subtle osl actually works by the way. This is exactly what i'm talking about You in like they're not actually underground given how you've painted them Okay, they're just not right now because they would have no warm tones on them at all Um, they would have all like cold blue light except for the little ring of light that their candle was creating So i'm okay with that. Uh, I think they look nice I think your biggest opportunity is probably just to continue pushing your contrast in stuff like the The metals is where I noticed it the most if we come back to these guys You can see in things like their weapons their axes which are pretty boring The gold which feels like it needs a little more variation But I do certainly like what you're doing here same with like the edges of the shield things like that You've got a clean confident hand. Yeah, I really like how you tackle the hair and the beards I think those look nice in most cases a few of them could use a punch more a little a little bit of a more Punch of contrast, especially the brown the brown ones is where you kind of tend to have it be very flat Um, but the the white beards the red beards and the blonde beards I actually think you did a nice job with so yeah, just punching up the metals continuing to push that And I think you'll have a Uh Think you'll have a real nice, you know real nice continuing dwarf army on your hands there But uh, great job made fantastic use of these these figures Super classic box set. All right rs. Um wanted to do a stone theme with a storm cast Try to go with a sculpture type look I still try to give the armor a gold look but make it more aged Sure So a little bit of like a concept army. It's hard for me to give feedback on I think it's fine I mean for what you're going for here. It's a concept army um The one thing I would say is like it it certainly is Fine for having that kind of a concept to it if you're going to try to sell stone then put cracks And stippling and stuff like that aren't the stone has Um stone is in a uniform piece like if you look at statues that sit out there in the wild like just google You know Let's see like old weathered statue Okay Like see this effect notice this chipping and pockmarked and stuff like this Like this is what happens to stone that sits outside Right, it gets this effect. There are cracks. There are pockmarks. There are stuff like that that happens in it, right? And this is the kind of thing you want to you want to integrate into your pieces these kinds of streaking these pox these stippling That's how you do that to sell stone effect, right? The green weapons i'm not too sure about I know you're going for an energy It's kind of looks a little too yellow. It's a little too like baby pukeish color to really feel like that You may like if you had picked like a really clean blue energy I might have been better it would have a contrasted more strongly against the rest of the miniature because then you would have had a little more of a A solid contrast between the two elements you're working in here the two colors working here But it also just would have felt like it was more standout It's the fact that the energy still contains the tone like the energy's true color is probably yellow Maybe yellow green and the stone's true color is yellow The gold's true color is yellow. So like in the end the whole thing is just yellow, right? These are all highly desaturated versions of those things, but they're all in that part of the the wheel, right? So that's something to think about but yeah cool cool take overall Okay, next up uh mattoos Let's say yes, uh simple necron warriors feel like there's something lacking like they don't pop enough Yeah, I think these guys look nice, man. I think you did a good job I mean the only things that really stood out to me is they uh Like the metals and everything feels applied really cleanly like the highlights on the black Uh, I think the metal the silver metal looks pretty nice the brown Sorry, the gold metal looks kind of boring and flat honestly I'd love to see that pop up with a little more shine have a little more colors glazed into the shadow I think the standout execution here is the green I think you did a really nice job doing some really careful highlights really really keeping that kicking up Seems like it's bright and glowing. So I think that's good The other element that jumped out of me right from the beginning was just the bases the bases are quite boring They're just gray stone again stone does not exist as gray. That's not how stone looks stone existed nature nature makes mud and dirt and growth and organic life like we live on a planet full of organic life So even though these guys aren't organic life and probably might live on a very dead planet Still having other colors worked in there. It could be rusts and oxides You know, you don't even need necessarily that many living things Just a couple other tones to make that more interesting could really help kick it up a notch Even it was just it's the tonal variation of hue Um, but yeah, I think probably if you wanted to really pop them It would be taking control of the light on that copper gold color Having some more purple tones in the shadows and more silver tones in the highlights But good-looking unit. It really it came out very well. So Yeah, thanks for submitting. Okay So next up we've got um guy New to the hobby painted around 20 minis first army you've painted Pity on the color scheme and advice on how to improve the painting. Sure Well 20 minis in here's my advice to you ready. I wouldn't even need to look at the minis Keep pushing your contrast work on your brush control And you know keep refining Your various paint technique, right? Like the baking tree you would comply the paint as a glaze and all those things Like 20 minis is nothing. You're brand new. I don't mean that as any insult. I just mean like If if fourth grader came to me and said they were really concerned about getting you know better with math I'd be like, well, you got a long way to go. We're not quite to differential equations yet, right? So now all that being said, I think you did a nice job here You're clearly you've done a good job. You've you've learned. I really like how you're executing on things things like the crystals on their On their bases look really nice. Uh, I think that the skin and your I guess whatever is kind of fleshy stuff I don't know if it's actually skin or just exposed muscle Whatever this stuff is. I think that looks nice and cleanly executed The black is a little flat. Um, it doesn't feel like it has the same level of contrast as everything else should Uh, or as it should given the materials, um, especially down here on these guys And then same with the uh, this is a nice shot here Same with the orange, which also tends to feel quite samey Like we didn't integrate enough shadows and highlights into the orange part Which I assume is some kind of orange or glow in some cases So we definitely want to have like hot spots and low lights where it's not as warm Um, I think your handling of the blue energy is really nice. Um, like that glow in his hand Me you need to smooth out with some glazes just a little but for the most part, I think it's a cool look And I think you executed on it pretty well So these guys are fun Uh, keep pushing keep working that everything I said at the beginning and uh, yeah, man great great looking army You did. I mean this is for 20 figs in you're you're killing it. Keep going Okay, next up carol, uh Only recently started painting for effect not for quantity Uh, appreciate some rough feedback on color choices and general composition So yeah, I thought about this a lot when I looked at these guys. I think they look nice I think that composition wise we need to break up some of them a little more So like I'm going to go I'm going to go bang bang bang left or right here So we'll start with the homie g here on the side. Uh, you know great fig Obviously, you know Nurgle figs always are very characterable and stand out Some of these elements feel like they need to be different colors If you look at the artwork, you'll see how they break up the helmet being like silver and the gut plate being silver But then the armor itself being green They do that because the fig is so dominated that it becomes kind of overwhelming If it's all in one tone So, you know breaking up the composition of the figure by having slightly different colors Things actually with real hues and given right now. They're it's yellow. That's it's you But making it not just like this metallic yellow or gold color or whatever would really go a long way to sell it Um the god the other two the main issue actually rests with the skin like a needing to push more Uh variation into the skin more purples and browns and uh or reds In the case of the guy on the right It would be like orange tones and purple tones and stuff like that and then bringing the highlights up more Through integrations of like ocasion flesh tones or stuff like that as the highlights to capture the light reflections on darker tones skin Um, that's going to be my main feedback for you there So again, a lot of it's just continuing to push that sort of contrast Compositionally, I think it's nice in the whole. I like that you have the purple element carrying throughout I don't see as much of it over on this guy I'd like to see a little more of this purple that you've integrated here in some places over on this to as I mentioned They kind of have those minimal elements to tie people together. I think would look good Like if this I don't know why you didn't do this sash Around him in this purple it would have been the perfect choice And we're really tied these guys together and as it is it would separate the sash that he's wearing From his open guts and rot which are basically the same color But you know if they were if this was this purple it would stand out and be very different It would also contrast really nicely against his darker tone skin and against the yellow of the The armor, so uh, yeah, there you go. Hope that helps Okay, next up, uh, patrick, uh started painting about a year ago. IG is your second army Uh, it definitely fits better next month is armor armor doesn't mean armor. You're wearing armor means Tanks vehicles airplanes. So no these would not fit Uh, and I would have deleted it So it's good that you submitted it this much this month. Um, okay Uh, overall composition on tones and so on and so forth. Okay. Yep Also looking for tips to chip and weather the red armor Uh, yeah, so my answer is, uh, I think these guys look great Doing a nice job. They do need chipping and weathering rust tones work fine on both reds and blues Because it's browns and oranges are, you know, pretty universally great Um, but you what you do with the red to make it stand out You know, so I've got, you know, hobby cheating like 90 90s somewhere in the 90s when I talk about chipping and battle damage Um, that's would be the place you want to be go check that out that technique goes and breaks down a lot of the stuff I've chipped Reds and blues and yellows and every color on the sun using the methods I talk about in that video With the reds you'll want it to stand out a little more So you're going to work some black into your brown to get the deep shadows and then you can have some little orange higher Running in there and you can run some brown streaks Down from it And I actually think you need to pop the red up a little more in some places It doesn't have quite the same level of contrast as the blue the blue armor here looks really fantastic I think that's the that uvex could cute it on really nicely Um, also like the weapons think they came out. Well, um, this guy's is a little messy up here in this area Where it kind of feels like it's not messy in the right way Um, as the rest of these do the rest of these feel pretty messy in the right way So I'd say that's where you want to go love the skin tone of the orcs and things like that Working in the red careful not to do it so completely evenly where it goes red to green because then it makes it look like you're exposing muscle You want some smoothing of the red to the the red lips into the green there unless they have like Real bunched up lower lip like this then you can then you can pop out just the um Uh, just a red color, uh, because it'll look like it's hanging down in your you can't see the transition Uh, but yeah with the red I'd recommend, you know, again, you're going to start with a black brown You're going to stipple around some things make some scratches hashes dots stuff like that Then you're going to bury in a little a little stipple of some lighter brown in the middle of the black brown to again Create contrast then a couple little dots of orange. You're going to low light the scratch So if this is the hole then there's going to be a line down here at the bottom assuming the light's coming from above That's sort of that bright red And uh, you're going to go from there so That's what I would say overall fantastic looking unit iron jaws is an awesome army um Yeah, and you can really see the difference in contrast by the way when you look at this photo Like just to put a pin on what I was talking about, right? Like look at the contrast you have on the blue Now look at the contrast on the red Right, it's not even close Right here here here here here Right, I mean that that tells the story right there So hope that helps Patrick All right, next up bartas feedback on these classic 90s ungours uh critique on the shields and the banner And uh when working with the oils, I find it difficult to see where the blends are smooth while the oils are wet and glossy It's only once they're dry a week later. They often catch areas. I don't don't look how I wanted them to Uh any tips for dealing with that any of the thoughts that you have on the unit would be appreciated Thanks so much. Yeah, sure So yeah, I can see some areas where you didn't get it mixed as much My answer is just be drawing your brush over everything. It should you should be smoothing things almost instantly So if they are not having that happen I'm not sure what's going on there. Um, but you want to just be taking that dry brush and just working around the whole thing The other thing is if you find out a week later that that's happened who cares go back over it Put drop do the second pass like so on let's talk about this front guy here We got this hard lines, right that don't make any sense great lay in some of that white gray and just Feather out the oil paints done and dusted jobs are good and you'll smooth right out that line You can go back for a second pass with oil paints. There's no issue to that. Okay Uh now as to the free hand and stuff on the shields. Thanks a look. I think it looks great great classic Ungor stuff there the uh little shirt strap whatever with the pva glue love it very creative Looks like a nice thick cloth Banner I've got no issues. So Good stuff. Yeah, I got I got no feedback for in that. I think that came out really well So overall cool unit, man This this beast army you've been building over the last year or two is going to truly be a thing to behold All right jasper. So he's looking for feedback on his uh, sorus And basically he was looking he's looking for schematic advice more so than technical And he was trying to make them look like they're made of stars. I'll tell you right now That's a really so so here's my thing jasper That's really hard to sell and the reason it's so hard to sell is because They're not made of stars. They're a physical thing that has physical Elements placed on it already. What's easy to make like it look like it's full of stars is a flat piece of paper I paint on right because it has no existing texture right Things that have texture don't want to be another thing, right? So I I appreciate what you're going for but I think you might need to take it a little less, you know less literally right so um The green I feel like we need to so with a let's let me talk about the green part first because that's you know Whatever as far as like not technically being specific stars um My answer with that is just you know work on kind of smoothing that out I would make the blades a different color. They probably shouldn't be green that you need like a better contrasting element there So I would have made them the same black and blue like as though they have star blades or something like that Right and on the blade edge, by the way, that's a place where you could sell the star effect really easily think of like michael morcox of um I can't think of his name right now michael morcox. That's not how you spell his name Elric that's his name. Why can I think of that his sword? right so Uh elric sword is like this, you know Crazy universe thing that has like real black with like sort of this crazy energy and stars and stuff in it It's often painted in that way So at any rate um that kind of stuff is what you could really sell there look up elric sword and you can find some good examples of it Now on the actual body itself my best advice is I like I don't mind the blacker color as the undertone But vary the the scales. No, I don't think it's a problem to highlight them individually I think that's it's time consuming. I mean you're gonna lose your mind depending on how many of these you do But the answer is you need to mix up the color pattern through the various stellar colors So you should have some scales be blue and some scales be white and some scales be pink and some scale, you know Like that faded star pattern color, right? Like when you see the stars scattered when people do those kinds of things in the street It's always stuff like that, right? It's always that kind of like light electric blue light pink white Right those the various star colors and that's what I would kind of mix them up as It's going to make them cacophonous But if you as long as you spread it out evenly and then have the very neutral tone as the green to balance them out It'll work better. It's still going to be hard to sell I'll be honest with you Like this is not an easy thing to sell and somebody's not going to likely look at it and think oh neat. They're a galaxy It's just probably not what's going to happen Okay, uh because it's just unlikely that you can because this thing is a lizard shape with lizard scales It isn't just like made of stars right Um when you think like think of eternity and marvel comics like keep googling stuff this time Marvel Eternity and infinity. Yeah, there you go these two Okay, so like yeah here boom. Okay eternity is full of universes and stuff, right? But look at how no texture is pulled out on him Like he has no features in him other than Uh the edges of his cloak and then a little bit of his face, right and everything else is flat two dimensional right And that's because if they if you tried to put this over Muscle texture and arms and biceps and everything like that. It just wouldn't sell as much So there you go. All right next up uh clay, uh Semi-converted stone guard, uh, and so he's mentioning that he has you know an injury and can't really Stabilize the whole thing. So I'll give you two options here clay. I read this earlier. So here's option one When you're trying to do the edges, I want you to rest your elbows on something I want you to lock your wrists together Like this so your elbows are on on the table on something solid like they have to be On a table wrists are locked. All right. We're going to put our one hand or on our other hand Okay, and we're going to hold the brush Choked up see how choked up on the brush. I am okay, and then what we're going to do Is we're going to just very carefully trace And trace Okay, we're going to get in there like that now If you've got if you if the miniature is not flat if you've got to hold the miniature at the same time Here's our holder for our miniature And we're going to put that into our hand like that Wrap this around it Sit this up against it. So again hand is still resting hand, right? Same thing we choke way up and we go like that okay now If the condition is such that you still have some shake and you can't do it. That's okay Don't worry. We got an easy answer for you. Okay, we can still solve that problem So what we're going to do is we're going to take a nice soft Makeup brush something like this like a dry brush, okay You're going to get a little bit of a lighter color than what you want like say a light blue Or something on it. Okay or a light blue white You're going to work it off the the bristles until there's basically nothing left I mean I want you to work into the paper into your paper towel until there's almost nothing there And then you're going to just very quickly just lightly in a real fast light touch motion Just work your way across the surface. Oh, so lightly. Look at how lightly I'm touching my hand, right? just very light, okay, and Then if you get some paint where it shouldn't be that's okay You can always just take some black and just lightly touch into those other areas that aren't the edges Try one of those two things see if they help you out But you don't risk as much when you're when you're um When your dry brush has got that little paint on it You might have to move your paint for your dry brush over the surface 50 times to really make a difference Fine, but then then it's working with your shake, right? If you've got a shake there because just you just let it go Just letting a shake over the mini And you'd be good these look great good stuff. I hope that helps clay Okay, next up Benton with his aldari wraith blades um So you're going for like a medium tabletop So feedback how to tie the unique colors of each model together here. I've tried white elements right here purple stomach cavities Yeah, so I looked at these guys earlier Um, I mean again how you want to tie them together is you want to create some unifying element across them, right? Uh Some kind of unifying element across them that is the same color like so I know you've got the different elements here, but they need to have something the same could also be like The symbol you put on all their white heads, but just a blank white head isn't enough now if they all had the same Logo, I don't know team name on the front of them that I think that's fine Honestly, my biggest challenge So that's kind of how I do that my biggest challenge is I think you might want to work on some paint consistency here And and just like you know making sure things are smooth in your paint application Like there's a lot of sort of chonkiness to some of this paint, especially some of the whiter stuff Um, you know wouldn't use pure white like this Um, you want to make sure your paint's applied cleanly you can see where white is still in the red there And as always, you know keep pushing that contrast, okay So I hope that helps, but yeah like a symbol or something on their face could help tie them together Okay, next up antonio. Um hammer brothers boomerang fire and hammer from super mario uh, sure Expert critique on helping create unity when the sculpture is similar But the colors are separate. I I think you did through making the Rock skin that they have or whatever it is the same color I think that's how you created unity. I do not think there's any discordance here that shouldn't be that shouldn't be here Um, they all appear to be the same type of creature the rock highlighting I think you executed on rather nicely Um, you may want to focus a little more volumetrically so that some up here at the top is a little higher than some down here at the bottom But that's a minimal touch where I actually saw opportunities for improvement We're a little more texture and stuff like that on the actual colors So the green the red the blue I'm having some scratches or stuff like that in the boots or different variation But your contrast is nice. Um, some of the metal appears very flat like the swords and the metal around here and things like that But the actual color execution their skin and their shells with the chitin and the texture Um, yeah looks great, man. I don't think you need to bring them together any more than you did So I think you did a good job Yeah, cool stuff I have no idea who made these things, but it's neat and if you made the plinths well done, that's super cool Okay, next up, uh, Daniel has his grim watch and he had said like please be very vicious Uh, sure. I don't I'm not going to do that, but I appreciate that Um, yeah, so Daniel, I looked over these earlier and I think where we want to focus in on is We need a little more control. I like the the variation of hue in the skin I think you did a nice job working in purples and pinks, but now we need to focus on the volumetric highlighting There's still not enough like the top of his head is basically the same color as the top of this side is here Is here is here, you know, like it's all kind of the same We don't really we aren't really heating the volumes They just kind of appear to be these squishy gelatinous masses because we didn't bring out any of the actual volumes of the minis, right So that's why I think you need to focus on next Like you've worked in the hue now take control of them to also take control of the value Right and make them nice and and and dark. Um as to the blood, of course, it's crazy But I mean it's all over the base. So I don't think it's a problem. It's interesting that's, you know, sort of spread over everything Um, the biggest challenge I see is stuff like we got to keep pushing contrast of value Uh, and then looking at popping detail on stuff like the bones the bat wings things like that Those are still very flat very boring like this bone here these bones here these bones here So again continue to really put both the texture and the contrast into those elements Not just the skin and stuff stuff like that. Okay So I hope that was harsh enough for you Daniel cool unit. Good job. Hope to see more from you in the future All right next up, uh, the death wing spearhead. Uh, yeah, so I took a look at these guys earlier. They look really nice Um, overall, I think the biggest thing I saw with them is opportunity for more contrast and volumetric Highlighting especially on the white. Um, the white looks rather uniformly applied all the way around It looks like it could use some more application of shadow. What's there is kind of soft So I think if we had a little more shadow up underneath a little more like the bottom of the knees the inside of these The bottom of their heads and stuff like that That's the number one thing I see as an opportunity for improvement Other than that, there's a couple areas where I'd continue to again push contrast of like the reds The reds are very flat around the guns feels like that could go uh, a little farther I like the wing execution the sort of blue white wings classically Um, so, you know color wise, I think you're in place with the sort of traditional color schemes Uh, and I think that the blue white is executed. Well, the green again could use a little more contrast pushed up a little more It works well if you push it up using the same ivory as the The guys themselves that way again, there's some harmony between the tones there. So Uh, very cool big, uh, big force there. So it looks really neat All right, allen So he said he you know, hopes he can paint in the in the future and, uh Two questions he had about both the transfers and then the blue armor doing going with like a zenith all and then applying a color So i'm going to tell you both real easy. So when you do a transfer, here's the key First of all, you should be using microsoft and microset That's these two, okay And making sure you run, um several different layers of, uh, microsoft over the top a couple times that softens the decal way down Once that's done, you're going to put a layer of either satin or gloss varnish over the whole surface Over the armor to the to the decal to the armor, okay You're going to let that dry then you're going to matt it out That gloss varnish is going to make the decal be indistinguishable from everything else. All right So that's what i'll say there now as to the zenithal and the air brushing It doesn't sell because you kind of blasted it and then just went back in and turned it blue Like this still needs the shoulder pad that's facing up would still have color variation on it, right? So there needs to be a shadow down here on this side thin shadow here up this ridge A brighter highlight here a brighter highlight here and so on and so forth So the airbrush is a perfectly fine way to get started But unless you're a surgeon with it where you can go in and hit those areas specifically You got to go in and you got to do the brush work to really create the individual plates Again, like i've talked about many times you don't have any like black line here in between We just blasted it with the airbrush and call it a day, right? So we got to get those dark in there the dark lines around the knuckles things like that This should be you know dark. This should be dark. This should be a much brighter highlight This should be a much brighter highlight, you know the center line down that kind of stuff We still got to go in there and then do the other work The zenithal can be a good starting point, but it also feels very heavy Like it feels like the blue you use is a very bright blue that has a high opacity and kind of blew away some of your work Um because it should look more faded So There you go. There's my answer. Alan. I hope that helps All right, Seth Uh after 20 years calling these sisters done. He was looking for success of the overall color scheme and composition Um the best way to to take the brass fittings and filigree to the next level Suggestions to improve their hair and then anything else that jumps out. Well, that's quite a lot, Seth All right So but I can hit it for you real simple the answer is across the board contrast just period to all four of your questions Okay, so The white again needs shadow needs complexity in it if you're going to this cream armor You don't want to fall into brown that just makes it look muddy So warm highlights equal cold shadows again falling into something like a panes gray Something lightly mixed in to create more volumetric highlighting around the white armor On the brass and the gold pieces and stuff like that again It's the same thing you but there you want to bring in some purple tones stuff like that It needs to be highlighted up with silvers I don't particularly love the color we chose here that stands out against it on say it kind of is like a very That the yellow tone the tier is very similar. I've never liked any of the sister's color schemes. They're base. I think they're all Bad, um, that's not on you at all. That's just I don't feel like the original people who decided the sister's color schemes Did it very imaginatively? and the um And like that I would pick a more Bright cold gold that will contrast better against the white honestly now as to the hair I mean, we need to go watch like my any any of my videos on hair brown hair blonde hair White hair black hair I've done them all but again, we need to create that panteen ring light, right? So you're especially with their hair their hair is the perfect panteen example But you want that light catching around the ring of the head, you know up like that Then a little bit here at the center next to the the The part and then a little bit down on the very end and then the shadows in between you're doing that by tracing those Nice thin lines in there and getting that going So but the story here is contrast all the way around pushing up the highlights Taking down the shadows that kind of thing the same thing sure unlike the ivory of the guns and all that sort of stuff so Hope that helps us All right next up Philip Aiming for a combination of something looks good on the table and reasonable efficiency for a big army project So Yeah, talking about how to make that more reflective look work with weather dirty looks So you just do because it still has light to it I mean, it's You can have weathered stuff that still has a reflection to it, right? So um, I think I think you need to to really break up that black Especially since black doesn't really show weathering very well because it's not really going to make a huge difference The thing that jumped out to me the most is the white is over weathered in some places Like it looks like we just got washed or oil or something stuck under here in like these big this big Tide mark or this stuff or this stuff like it doesn't feel like a stain of dirt So if you're going to go that direction, it should be organically coming up from the the bottom with like a stippling motion To get it up there. Um, I like the use around the shoulders. I think that feels more organic That feels correct to me But on the whole I think your scheme works I would work a little more color into the bases try to mix in some reds some oranges some browns some greens Something like that It's a little bit in here. It needs to go farther. It needs a little more highlight as well Probably a second layer of you know dry brushing or something like that Just to bring all those edges out and really create some visual interest So that'll sit doing that kind of stuff still fast easy keeps you in the tabletop land But gives you a good looking tabletop standard. So hope that helps All right next up Darren for a storm cast the raven is just a photoshop thing right now, but he wants to work on a deco for it Uh, so what he's looking for is it's an army. He doesn't want to spend too much time Any tips on making the armor grittier whilst keeping the cool tone of the miniature doesn't want traditional rust Sure. Do the same thing as rust. Just do a different color It's fine. Um, if you watch the adding extra steps to the cast wear video I use like bright vertigris to do the rust with and to do rust streaks and stuff on my cast warriors with crimson armor Because I didn't want browns in them Rust is a function of how something looks. It's that stippling and chipping and streaking It can be done with any color Um, and as a point of fact, it's not like rust is some odd rust, which is just oxidation Has no singular effect. We tend to think of that with iron But I mean, you know, but there's lots of other examples if you go look at rust pigments I mean, there's yellow and red and magenta and Ochre and everything else under the sun, right? So you can play around with all that but yeah, you could have, you know Scratches and stipples and and stuff like that working with vertigris colors, for example Like I did that would be a perfectly fine pick, right? So it could be leaking something like that It could have a more green tone to it, right? Maybe it's sort of oxidizing in more like copper wood or something like that Uh, there's lots of ways you can play with it and that's kind of what I'd recommend Um, I understand you don't want to spend too much time on each guy I think I'd still work on the cloth a little bit more pop that up. Uh, just a tad Um, you know Because it just especially up at the top of them It feels like it needs a little more of a highlight a little bit Um, but other than that, I think you've you know, you got a good scheme going here I think it looks nice You can also just focus on regular hashes and scratches instead of full on rust, right? Like so get that nice super sharp thin brush get sharp thin lines going is Little dots little hashes little scratches call it a day that can make him look weathered without too much You know sam lends a pretty big Proponent of that and he doesn't he makes it look great So you can go look at his stuff like when he did gaza ghoul's armor You can see exactly that kind of tactic in play So there you go. Hope that helps darin All right next up lee, um, first fully painted unit one with a dogwood vibe I've been trying been painting for about a year with a two-year break and we train Uh looking for any an all cnc. Yeah, I mean my honest answer to you here Lee is going to be you know, continue to push that brush control that color control that contrast It feels like we're not getting our base coats on smooth One thing that I'll say the scale line is not very good for is like I like scale colors a lot But they're not good for base coating honestly because they're they tend to be very transparent They're hard to use. They're a gel That's why I don't stick to one paint line something like a vallejo Or a pro acrylic is going to give you a much better base coat and then I use the scales to blend over top of it Right like that's why this green looks really weak and spotty and stuff like that because it's just not made for it Um, you know, right tool right purpose. You see a screw in the wall. You don't do that You know, that's loose. You don't get out of hammer, right So, um, but again, we need to work on the brush control and the cleanliness of the application Somewhere in here, you know in some place in here I know is where we got some paint jumping in places It shouldn't be we want to really work on getting a nice smooth base coat down to the color Getting that color really cleanly applied and then we want to work on contrast But you know bringing those blends up popping those colors out Especially on the green when you got a tone like that You want to really make sure it has contrast to it because it's the bright element of your mini So it needs to be fully popped out and uh and and and rockin Okay, so uh, watch my understanding contrast videos stuff like that and keep practicing Okay, edwin, uh First time posting trying to make an army pop. What tips could you give me to make them pop even more sure So I looked these guys over earlier. I like that. You've got the freehand bases look super cool Biggest thing I noticed was the black armor is pretty flat Um, you know, it just doesn't have the the variation I expect same with a little bit of the red around the side everything here is clean I love how clean you're painting like the gold That works for me needs a little bit more yellow midtone doesn't have quite enough three Doesn't have quite enough five, but for the most part it works like it You know, we need to do a little darker and we need to extend out the volumes of our midtones just a little But it's working. Um, the biggest thing is I think we just need to punch some more, uh, uh Contrast of value into the black. That's literally the biggest thing that stood out to me This is a great looking dawn rider unit. I'd certainly notice if I was judging so just keep pushing that contrast I think you're doing great stuff here All right, next up we've got william first time posting most recent unit is grass racks Uh So I think again most of what I've said here so far again more contrast. I noticed it especially in the skin Um, the I like how you've used the greens here. This is kind of what I was talking about before You know punching in those yellows and stuff to make the green pop I think you need to carry it out through everything Like some of these elements have really nice highlights and things to them Some of them are really flat like this little leaf sheet jumping off of or whatever, right? so, um You know, but the orange skin is what I see is being really flat like there's no texture. There's no fur There's no variation. We really got to push that contrast and punch it way way up So that's what I would really focus on much more variation of hue and value especially on the flesh All right next up robin, uh, so I've got some untamed beasts here uh Yes, we do need some better photos. I'll say that for sure like set the photos down Don't use direct lighting put a background up. Take a picture with your camera Okay, like find a spot in the house, but some lights not directly at them or turn lights on in the room non-direct lighting Adjust with your camera shoot don't make it more complicated than it is But we're going to look at this photo because this is probably the best photo in here So I like what you're pushing forward with the skin and the contrast there I think you were successful now. We got to take it to the rest of the model, right? We got to still again get that cleanliness in there get those dark lines separating things Um, especially on stuff like the helmet to the fur things like that Um, but we've got to create those contrast in those other elements like the skin has really nice values of reds and purples It's got really good contrast Then I look at these horns and they're just those zebra stripes all the way down There's this part isn't any darker than this part or here or here They're the exact same from beginning to end with no variation whatsoever, right? And I don't know what's going on there same with the bone like here on this guy's top or this guy's bone here Like so we got to get a lot, you know get that stuff clean Bright popping you want to be bringing them all into the same light Bring them all up to the level that you did the skin at You it's clear that you took a lot of time on the skin did a great looking job and then the rest of the mini Doesn't feel like it's at the same level. Okay, so there you go. Hope that helps All right, uh, Matthew, uh, so with his, uh, retributor squad test army for his 3000 point, uh Sister's army, uh, what's the next step in terms of contrast brush control of separation of elements? Uh, this is a lot of questions Matthew. This is too many questions. Okay, I'm going to tell you right now I'm not I can't do a novel for you, buddy. All right No One question maybe two eight is too many. I appreciate a set of time allows it doesn't Okay What's the next step in terms of contrast brush control separation of elements? What can I do to improve the scheme? Why do my oil paint sometimes unbind separate loose contrast over time? Like on the purity seals Uh, it seems like they were blended smoothly as the placement of the nmm reflections close enough to correct placement Should I be redoing the reflections they come to dull blend and thicker the base is too big and chunky? Does the copper outlined muddy marbly effect work? Is it normal for thin paint to be incredibly model over black? Even if several coats I'd switch to white ink after fighting chunkiness with a white paint Even with a scale color artist white reaching chunky white opacity around three coats objectively Did I reach the tabletop plus standard parade ready when I'm missing two accomplished reach at standard? Okay So Let's get into it All right, I'm gonna take we're gonna start from the ground up here. Okay Uh, we gotta find a picture here. All right So first off with the ground don't do this Don't put big chunks of stuff over the top of the base extending outside of it like that You can extend a base a little bit. Don't extend it a lot Okay, like little tiny things can poke over the side sometimes Don't go crazy when you have that like this doesn't look like it's sitting on base This looks like you took a giant chunk of rock slapped it down on the base It doesn't feel like it's part of any world. That's because I can't see any world around it That needs to be smaller. It needs to be shrunk. Don't do that Like don't do that thing this no good If this was cut down to be smaller than the base itself These would look 10 times better right out of the gate Number one number two on the the bases themselves pop them up a little more Okay, like they need to have more highlight more catch to something Okay Now let's move up into the armor the black armor, right? So we've got inconsistent in the way we're highlighting these Like I had to look at these a couple times because I honestly thought the the chest armor was like Made of a different material Then the rest of the the armor like their corset is separate, but this is just armor So either all of the black needs to come to this broad highlight Or this should not be this broad of a highlight over their chest Like we've got to take control of this light here So This one is probably like this really shows it off. Like this just looks like literally a different color armor than this Okay So we've got to get like as far as Uh applicant like if we're working in oils and you're using my my oils techniques, right? Then you've got to smooth that out and make sure you're pushing the same highlights over the whole thing Okay, and again volumetrically like the backpack on this feels the closest to correct But look at other where other people have placed highlights on this look in the art Right and look where they place the highlights and how they do the colors You can you you can like this is too much white This is lost any semblance of blackness, but these are fine shoulders fine backpacks great So this is what you need to be aiming at across the whole surface Okay, the red red needs much more shadows needs to push much farther Okay Um bird needs more contrast needs more definition individual elements picked out We still need to keep working on that paint cleanliness like things need to be more separated Dark lines in between light lines. You want light dark light dark light dark, right? And you so the more you can alternate that with confidence the better All right It's for example, give you a very simple example right here on this girl You've got this piece stretching down the middle like the whatever this thing is that runs down the middle of her There's no light on that that could be highlighted right each edge of those could be highlighted Like when I did my recent sister, I traced around the edge Like three of the edges of every one of those pieces Right that creates light dark light dark light dark light right there seven color changes or whatever in that space All right, that's a vision that that creates that visual interest Okay Now So again, the key is going to be like we got to get that black armor Balanced out go and look at you know, why did it again? You want a soft highlight? It can go up to white at the very very highest points. Okay now Why does oil paint sometimes unblend separate or lose contrast? They're gonna they're not unblending They're just losing contrast because they dry when it's wet Water is reflective right even if it's not water It's white spirits like My hand is now shiny right I didn't paint it it didn't change contrast. It's just wet So it's reflecting light right so when your white spirits are in there. It's very shiny paint And so that white throws it off makes it look brighter than it is looks different than it is It's going to dull as the paint settles Is the placement of the nmm reflections close enough the backpack looks good the legs look good You know, but I would go watch like again Just look at the actual art or go look at other people like you know Go look at the high-end folks who've tackled sisters and that'll give you your light placement This is a fig that's been painted Thousands of times by high-end painters right so you've got all the maps you want in the world Uh, I answered the base Already, um, is it normal for thin paint to be incredibly modeled over black even after several codes? um Yes, it can happen because you're talking about Uh white paint over black like you can't do that. You've got to build up to it right you you can't paint So the highest possible value transition you could have just done right you can't put white directly over black It's got to build up You've got to go white to a low gray to a mid gray to a high gray to white or something like that If you really want a smooth transition like you will never cover pure black with pure white It's just the nature of acrylic paints or even oil paints just says that's not going to happen. Okay So are you at a tabletop standard? Yeah, sure. Absolutely you are. Yes Keep pushing those contrasts and stuff like that and then we'll get it tomorrow. All right Alan more weights blade coven Looks really good. I looked at these guys earlier again. I see the non-metallic. This is Uh, I love this. I love how this came out. Um, really like the gold The gold needs a little more one a little more white some catches especially here on the sisters of slaughter's head A couple other catch lights and stuff like that is what I'd love to see you focus on Silver i'm digging we need to smooth the blends just a little bit in between our darkest spaces We're dropping like way into the dark real fast. I don't feel we earned it quite that quickly So a little bit more of a smooth like take that darkness and just glaze that smooth out just a little bit love the uh Love the snake body. Um, that looks good. That looks familiar. I like that. Um, the The the corsets and stuff like that that is red with contrast. I am loving it. I'm here for it Ba da da da like this is her the the reds and the way you handle the contrast there is fantastic So great great absolute success. Alan these guys are these girls. I should say I apologize are Just top-notch. I really love what you executed on here. Um Yeah, looks looks wonderful. So there's my feedback for you Wonderful wonderful blade coven All right, steven, uh queen city aurorans for blood bowl Focus on improving contrast in general, but also feel like your skin needs work I agree with both statements. I think you've nailed it. Those would be the two things. I would tell you to work on Especially the contrast in the metal I actually think things like the contrast in the feathers Is fine Some of the reds look okay We need to push it a little farther the blues look rather flat, but the metals look really flat Right, that's where we need to work on that true metallic metal and really really take control of that light Control those shadows pop those highlights. Okay Um, but these look really nice like the it's clean as well executed. They're bright I mean like the it's these are very good. So please steven. Don't take it any other way But I I completely agree with your assessment Keep pushing in those directions more tonal variation or value contrast on the metal and a little more variation of hue and value in the skin But good job Okay, Liam Old shadow spear box Okay, uh paying these to the high tabletop standard would be super grateful If you could give me some pointers on my volumetric shading highlighting Sure, so um Yeah, if we're going for the matte It feels like we still need to push a little more shadow in there, especially on stuff like the arms Again, like just this is what I do every month because I really feel impressed to show this Like this is to impress upon people look at how dark this is Right Compared to this I'm in a very bright room with lights all around me bouncing in all directions primarily from above But not only like this is much like being outdoors and look at how significant the shadows are right So I think people sometimes hold back as they're like, well, it's not realistic to have that kind of shadow So Again, yes Yes, it is Like shadows are strong under bright lights Right, so I think, you know, you could do that without really spending too much more time or stuff on that So I think that would be where I probably push you to go really just deepening down the shadows I think your highlights are fine You could push those a teeny bit more, but I wouldn't you know, it's not that the main area the main areas I don't feel like we have enough five Not so, yeah, that's right tell you to go but cool cool stuff overall I like how they came out. Um, I like the blue. I think that works good You might want to extend the the white just a little more to kind of take control there Like fade. I don't mean like just extend pure white. I mean glaze some of that white out from it Just to kind of fade something it feels like we're really consistent Like this is all the same color blue and then white then all the same color blue and then white And then all the same color blue and then white All right, we need to take that white and stretch it out as a glaze So there's a little more like white blue than white, you know white white blue and then white blue and then white blue blue and thin blue Right that kind of thing Okay, next up, uh Eugen uh submission from february feedbacks on critique for the animal skin texture Um, yeah, I mean we need to keep pushing it right is really the simplest answer I have for you There is not enough contrast of value or hue Like so again when you're doing with fur I have I have a video on how to paint fur on creatures that don't have fur Andy wordle also has an excellent video on cult of paint that deals with the same thing things like this horse So like that there's just not enough attention paid here to the volumetric highlights To the contrast of value and to the texture, which is the most important thing or stuff like this Like the hair is too flat the bones are too flat the spear is too flat The fur is too flat everything's too flat, right? So we really got to push that value up and uh and and add to that so You know adding in fur texture and paying more attention to the volumetric highlights Like they just they do not feel volumetrically highlighted at all is the short answer to your question So there you go All right coal, uh, okay Uh, so um going for kind of dark and gritty look any ideas on different detail on space rings So you can use to similarly elevate the units up to the standards I mean, I think these guys look good for what you're going for like, you know You're going for this tabletop standard. You're using the red metal technique You can do some more scratch and wear on the armor shows some exposed steel not silver steel um, you can have uh A little more contrast and stuff like popping the gold up the gold feels rather flat and just kind of like It's gold and there's not really much tonal variation to it That would probably be my number one thing I would go to and then finally as I've said many times Like bases the world isn't full of gray stone the world is full of color So, you know adding some color to those bases is probably a good way to go All right next up joseph ultramarine terminator assault squad with terminator captain Uh, first time using a light box any cnc for many photography would be appreciated Um, yeah, I think the photography is fine Um, again with the biggest thing that jumps out of me, I mean, you know good Let's look at this picture We've got too much direct lighting and not enough indirect lighting by the body like that's what you need to do You need to we need a lot more light that isn't directly focused on the thing I honestly don't use a light box anymore because I don't love them. I need to do a new video on taking a photo um I just think light boxes in the end don't really work for miniatures, but Like I like a backdrop but not a box um The biggest opportunity I see here is is contrast especially on the metals which all appear rather flat But it also happens on things like the cables Stuff like the claws need their bright edge highlights brought out Um, the armor plates need some edges and things like that to really pop it up That would take these really and elevate them to the next level. So, uh, tonal variation on the metals tonal variation on things like the Things like the leathers and stuff like that those both appear very flat and then uh, finally contrast and stuff Yeah on things like the basing and those other elements, so The cables and those kinds of other things that all appear kind of just flat like those smaller elements You put a lot of work into some faces and kind of general highlighting of the armor But then we didn't really go the end distance. So that's what I know. It's there all right, kai, uh so Okay, so again much the same thing they look very nice, but we don't have but so two thoughts here one again We don't have the right amount of contrast We need more volumetric highlighting stuff like that more to control the light and shadows To the edge highlights are way too fat like way way way way way too fat So we got to get control of that go watch my video on sharp thin lines and that'll give you Um good control over that because it's important with space marine armor Like you can't have a line like this There's two ways to do it I have both an edge highlighting video and then a Cheating it edge highlighting video where you could draw a line like this and then you come back in with This blue and you push the paint right up next to it So you cheat your way into an ultra thin line You can go either one of those directions and that would be fine The other thing I'll say is this isn't battle damage. It just like it it doesn't read like battle damage to me. It reads like paint Um, you go watch my my battle damage video again Again, like I mentioned earlier hobby cheating 90 something and you know, we need more smaller scale small Stipples dots scratches stuff like that. Um, Darren Latham also has a great video on doing battle damage on space marines This channel is still up magically so Um Watch that was those while you can uh, and I would say, you know, go watch either mine or his And uh, or both and that'll give you some good idea on how to get that battle damage under control Final thing and I've said it a lot stone is not gray. It is not cork It does not look like this never put cork on your base always cover it with something some kind of texture Some something and stone isn't just stone. It isn't just gray. It has color It has browns and reds and greens and purples and everything under the rainbow Because nature is nature and it's random and organic and that's how it should look. So there you go Okay, uh, Jacob, uh, best of gores Uh, first attempt painting a whole unit biggest project so far Try to integrate some oil colors into the process. What would be a good next step to improve in general? What would be a good next step when you tackle a unit again? Yeah, so I looked at these guys these guys look really great, man I really love the the striking like extreme blue steel blue steel Uh, of the of the best of gores really wonderful. Um, I honestly think that looks fantastic The the challenge I have here is that the bones and kind of their skin and stuff like that aren't elevated to the same level And I don't mean that just in because you worked an incredible on a contrast and it's very striking That's true But also because they just don't feel like they're taken to the same level like the individual furs on on the bottom Of his little goatee isn't picked out the bone feels kind of samey and doesn't really have the same level of control The skull again doesn't have the same level of volumetric highlights The base itself again more more detail and texture picked out I know I do like the clothing that you have in this one like the texture you added there But again, like stuff like the leather straps here When you got this big axe, you know, you want to make sure these are dark and that you have the edges of this highlighted Like these should have some little tiny edge highlights on them to show they're catching light stuff like that So I'm not asking you to take the contrast on the other elements up to the same level you took this this Like blue steel steel armor up to um, but it definitely needs more contrast Especially because you've you've drawn the armor in such striking colors That the other elements need to still Exist right and they just fall away So the skin the cloth and the bone is really what jumped out at me is meeting Needing more tonal variation and should really have some additional work put into it. So there you go Okay, next up uh jacob Uh, so with uh some white scars um Okay, uh looking for battle damage and white armor. So, you know the white armor um Looks mostly fine. Again, you need deeper shadows, which means grays and stuff like that um Look at like garith nichols when he painted his white scars Look at andy wortles white scars video You see how they use grays in that right? That's the key to painting white is you don't pay much white again This is a white shirt or this is you know has a lot of white in the shirt How much whites in that shirt not a lot when we think we paint white we got to paint all white That's not how white works right like the bottom of the top of this drink. This is not white right here This is like blue black gray right So The key is about 50 of the surface needs to be the color to read is the color So watch those videos watch my painting smooth white video. You'll see how much gray and stuff like that. I using it Now as to battle damage. The problem here is again go watch my battle damage video that I mentioned many times um, you know, we just have too many chips that are all too the same like um Darren again his battle damage video You need they're they have too many tiny little scratches with not enough that they're all uniformly the same Like it looks like these guys just got sprayed by gravel right So they need to have Battle damage that looks purposeful different size strikes You know very random like in the end here. Let's go down. I'll show you exactly the guy who's the big offender or one Where's he at? Here we go Okay, so like a lot of these are just the exact same size stuff This is the best take on it because here you created something really nice and different But again, there's no difference like the top has just as many scratches as the bottom basically That wouldn't be the case right his legs and stuff will be getting scraped up from being hit by rocks and things like that And we do have directional scratching from him walking the top if there's scratches They're going to be from things like bullets or claws or somebody he's fighting with right So you're going to paint that kind of stuff into it and again, they should be darker They should have more of a deep brown black element to them Again, check out Darren's video. He'll send you in the right direction So there you go All right, uh six eliminators for the blood ravens some feedback on them overall Um Yeah, so again looked at these guys earlier. The answer is yes First of all, these guys are way too far away. We got a buddy. We gotta zoom the camera in here Are you gonna crop on me like this is not Like i'm looking at the miniature from the other side of the room and you're asking me what I think about it It's too far away But yes, I can I can see especially in things like the furs and stuff like that We are nets or whatever they're wearing. Yes, it's continue to push contrast. Um avoid these things Okay, like if you're going to use them because you're going for guys shooting in a swamp fine But if you're going to use them, then they need to be painted Which means you got to take washes and you got to run the washes down them unpainted elements of tufts I've talked about this a million times make your fig look fake So you need to have lots of different, you know, take a wash work it in there wash it down And uh and create that variation You also want to dry brush the top of them some as well That will give them the same level of contrast that everything else in the world seems to be painted with So it'll make them feel like they actually fit in the world not like this where they they they feel completely out of scale Focus and color with the lighting of the rest of the miniature. So there you go. Hope that helps Okay, next up Michael, uh first time posting, uh, okay, so feedback on tmm armor Uh, which mostly did with the airbrush applied inks over the metal color aluminum Some models seem a little too busy or hard to read not sure how to improve with the green blade and shields are working They're too overwhelming. All right, so No, the green blades are fine. They're like necrons. That's how they look They look crazy town and I think they're fine. You may want to smooth some of the blending Now as to when armor looks flat. Why is that happening? Well, it's because you're painting a color over aluminum only if you're going to paint a color over it You have to pre shade the metals, right? So you do aluminum then you do silver from above then you do black from below or something Then you put the color over Okay, that way you already have built-in contrast and it's going to make it really pop Now as to the I mean to me the green looks very striking. You've pushed it around the various points of the model I honestly don't have a problem with it. Most of the time it's in their faces as well Which draws attention back there. Necron blades are always, uh, you know attention stealing But that's mostly on the big guys like the the lords or whatever So that's fine on the other dudes. It feels pretty fine the lich guard the shields and the weapons are a huge part of the Mini so yeah works for me. So there's my feedback. I hope that helps Cool-looking stuff, by the way. I really dig how they came out All right. Finally, Oliver, uh towel fire wearer squad a full squad I've painted together first time I've used my airbrush and brother than just zenithal prime Use some of your yellow imperial fists and city bases videos and painting these guys awesome. Yeah, so um Looking good. We need to keep pushing the contrast on both things like the bases And you know go back and watch the painting video again. I didn't I didn't just make it gray stone I do appreciate that you worked the greens and browns in though. I can see that I see that and I like that So thank you. Um, but keep pushing that up there. You still need more high highlights Like really look at how much I push the contrast on those that stone and stuff like that Now on the yellow, we need to keep pushing the contrast. We need more of that rust color brought in there Um, also probably want to make sure that the panels are nice and struck out Some of them look pretty clear. Some of them not so much So like if we look at this guy, some of these panels could be more well defined You also want to kind of avoid Like this yellow is very bright and like sun yellow You really want more of an ochre color or something like that worked in there Like it's just a little too cartoony of a yellow Especially when combined with two other very bright colors the orange and the blue My honest answer would be I would cut out one of those colors or something Um, probably the orange and turn it into more of a brown tone or something like that Like we need to neutral something out these guys feel cartoony because they're all hyper bright colors Right and it's just kind of overwhelming to the senses Um But cool stuff. Hope that helps oliver and uh, there you go. So with that we come to the end of the month So thank you to everybody who submitted fantastic work this month. Great stuff everyone Really appreciate all of the uh, hard work and the guts it takes to put it in there Remember marches theme is armor, which is not armor like the armor you're wearing armor the traditional meaning Of like tanks and aircraft and heavy machinery So that is what we are doing this month Uh, I'm going to go look at that right now to make sure no one got confused after I read the iron jaw stuff Uh and thought people might be confused But if you want to join us remember the links down below love to have you thank you to everybody who submitted Thank you to everybody who submits anything or who helps who answers questions in the pmp. Remember This is a positive community that's focused on growth as long as we all together want it to be So please remember to if you see something you like stop say hey, I really like that give them a thumbs up Like the post share that positivity because that's what keeps keeps people growing Learning hobbying and taking the next step on their journey just like we hope you do too So with that I will sign off and say thank you very much everyone. I really appreciate it. And as always We'll see you next time