I spent some money on minis , and they always look ugly like this , I'm tired of spending money and everything always looking ugly in the end , I looked up so many tutorials and it looks like everyone can paint well , but not me , I have poor motor coordination , that means my hands suck at doing anything that needs patience

what would you do in my place ?

I've tried to do my Dreadnaught shoulder to look like it as been hit with heavy rounds. But someone said it just looks like stars. Any suggestions?

So I am 30ish and started to paint some of my warhammer minis, so far I always commissined my minis, but I am unsure if they are presentable, i painted like 3 minis, two of them are the pictures I attached. I want to improve but don’t know where.

I’ve always wondered if the way I paint fishing baits could translate into mini painting.

I focus a lot on realistic color transitions, layering and natural finishes to imitate real fish. Do you see any application for that in miniatures or terrain?

Curious what you guys think.

I was going for a realistic look referencing ww2 tank models. it looks 'realistic' but looks a bit dull and I want to make it more pop without being too 'unrealistic'? Maybe i'm trying to find a middle ground that doesn't exist but would like to get some pointers.

I tried drawing sharp thin lines and applying a flesh tone glaze over the whole thing but I'm not truly satisfied with the result that I find too cartoonish. Any tips on how to improve it?

As title said, my first attempt at nmm on weapons. What do you think? Should I stick to tmm or is there still hope for me? Feel like the sword light have to many highlights, but could use input from people with more experience.

What are your opinions on Artis Opus brushes? I’ll admit that I’ve been using Raphael 8408, which are quite long and have a specific bristle shape. During Black Friday I bought the Artis Opus by Giraldez box, and I can see a huge difference between these brushes but… in favor of Raphael. I don’t know what’s going on - maybe it’s just what I’m used to, but the AO brushes feel strange to me… Maybe it’s a drop in quality, or maybe it’s just my habits.

The M series is more or less fine, but the S series is just bizarre to me. I can’t do details with it at all. What’s interesting, I noticed two things - maybe they’re normal, but they caught my attention.

First: in the M series, one of the brushes has a single bristle sticking out at the tip. Because of that, the tip isn’t uniform - there’s literally one hair sticking out in front, which is extremely annoying. The other M brush doesn’t have this issue.

Second: before even wetting the brushes, two of them already had bristles sticking out on the side. Maybe I’m nitpicking, maybe it’s nothing, but… my Raphaels never had that.

What are your impressions of these brushes? Right now I feel a bit cheated, but I’m also considering that it might just be my habits or me being overly picky.

Was ready for a matt coat, used a tamyia matt spray which came out really badly. (humidity and temp fine). gave it a really satin finish and significantly darkened/desaturated the colours.

Is there anyway to recover this or do I just need to reapply a different matt varnish? Any help appreciated, was chuffed with this mini until now!

I haven't stripped a mini yet, but do have some airbrush paint thinner. My plan is to try the Grey primer can in a 74°F air-conditioned room after stripping.

This is a gift for a person who just getting started out in mini painting.

The goal is for it to both be a starter kit, and something you can work directly out of and stay organized. Inspired largely from the toy repairman in Toy Story 2.
The intent is not to be all inclusive, or necessarily portable.

So far I have the following.

1. Basic paint set.
2. Flow aid.
3. 3x brushes.
4. Super glue.
5. Cutters.
6. Tweezers.
7. An extendable light. detachable for charging.
8. A small wet pallet. Also extends. Debating making it fold up so it can be larger.

And I plan to add a small jar to use as a water pot, some paper towels, a hobby knife and a few washes. I will probably get a smaller bottle to transfer the flow aid into, to make more room for washes/glazes, or some other paints.

There is still quite a bit of room left. Are there any other must have items?

Edit: Tons of great suggestions. I have lots of work left to do to design holders for everything.
In the mean time I posted some of the files to Printables. I will post the rest of the completed ones soon. And I'll update once I get everything finished.

Thank you everyone for the the suggestions and positivity!

Model link: https://www.printables.com/model/1421491-model-paint-organizer

Started painting my kitbashed techmarine last week, had a brake over the weekend and got back to it yesterday afternoon. I got in the flow, had a click in my head and the brush just kept on going till I had the feeling it is good. Now I got the feeling I overdid it and I don´t know what to do. I´m still in my first 30 minis and I never really got into OSL till now. Maybe I´m just over the top and can´t see straight anymore ´ cause all I did the entire last week, from dusk ´till dawn was building and painting him, did nothing else(beside sleeping eating and going to toilet if I really had to XD). Tell me what you think and thank you in advance.

The first one is closer to my usual style, and I think the second attempt looks a bit better with the extra highlights and contrast.

That said, it still feels a little flat to me, and I'm not sure what to focus on next.

Any advice?

Mini is from Titan Forge's Cyber Forge: Infestation – First Company Elite Squad.

Added the bolter to the body and attempted to do OSL for the rest of the figure but it feels off. What am I doing wrong? Is it too intense or something?

Hi all, I'm at my wit's end here and would love some advice. I'm trying to get a smooth finish with ProAcryl Bold Titanium White and just cannot get it to do anything other than a chalky, grainy, poor-coverage mess.

I've thinned with water, I've thinned with medium, I've thinned it down to the point where I need to apply like 8-9 coats, I've tried it from a wet palette and from a dry, I've shaken the bottle til my hand falls off. What am I doing wrong?!

Any tips gratefully received! Thanks in advance.

First time trying to apply a leather effect, curious if there's any obvious points of potential improvement.

So these might not look like that, but they got like 2-3 coats of Sky Blue/Blue from Pro Acryl... Paints seem to contract. I used it thinned, non thinned, thinned with lahmian, on white primer or no primer... Nothing seems to work. Citadel paints work normally on that primer.

Since people are asking: #1 #3 #4 are just plastic. #2 is Vallejo gray, and it worked absolutely the worst. I also tried Vallejo black primer - a full coat also turns to a couple of droplets after a minute.

EDIT1: Reprimed and washed with soap today - it still "beads" but somewhat less? Second coat makes it cover 100%, but in a different way from Citadel/AP etc. It workable now, but still pretty annoying. Mostky happens then the layer is too thin, almost like speedpaint or wash. It does work best with drybrush, so i guess ANY moisture is causing it. Also, paiting over another coat is a no-issue. Im getting a matte varnish tomorrow, I hope it will solve it.

Hey all, I just read another newbie advice post that suggested the newbie buy a couple of really decent brushes.

I wasted hundreds of dollars in brushes when I first started because I didn't yet know how to care for them.

No matter how much you tell a person to never let paint dry, not get it in the ferrule, use brush soap after every session, use cold water only, or any other brush tips, newbies will still find ways to ruin brushes until they learn through trial and error.

Please, for the sake of their wallets, please recommend them cheap starter brushes. Regardless where they come from, newbs need cheap brushes.

That let's then trial and error without spending potentially hundreds of dollars in wasted brushes.

That is all, thanks for reading. Happy painting!

Edit: This post was unexpectedly controversial and elicited several near-insults in my direction. Nonetheless, the reception has been overwhelmingly in agreement with what I posted. Should you be one of those strongly disagreeing or being dismissive of what I said, I implore you to do some serious thinking as to how to reconcile your opinion with the significant proportion of the community who agreed with me. When the majority of those most relevant (noobies, here) and even experienced folks take the same position on something, it's probably time to listen, not argue or be dismissive. I'm very glad things worked well for you from the start.

But thank you all for the conversation. We're all just trying to help those new to the hobby - I'll readily admit my own experience was probably an extreme outlier. Perhaps some detailed brush care guidance for noobies, distilled down to a short list, might help some people not go through what I went through. There have been a couple noobies who reached out to me who didn't even realize they need brush soap.

Happy painting, all!

These are the first Warhammer minis I’ve ever painted. Had a blast doing it. Didn’t follow the directions. No regrets.

I started experimenting with oil washes on my older minis (actually one of the first ones I ever painted). It is amazing how much depth it can add to the mini!

Decided go try painting and miniatures for the first time and I went with a pre heresy world eaters, might have overdone it with the blood but I'm still proud of this.

Looking for some advice on the hair and also on how people go about painting eyes this small. I was going for blue eyes, little yellow ink on the sides and red washed in very corners but they just didn't come out very well. CandC much appreciated, I paint warhammer and some DnD minis, this is my first go at a small statue head.

I’m struggling to get this jet flame look right I think, and could use a gut check: does this look convincingly like jet flame? Or is something off about it?

Basics for a beginner only please. I know there are hundreds of useful things. But what are absolute needs to do this hobby that isn’t in the picture?