Dry Brush Technique

[paladin72]

What is the dry brush technique? What is the best way to do it?

[Doomtoy]

This is easy, and does FANTASTIC things for highly detailed figurines. You start with a FLATHEADED brush, not a pointed one, and dip the very tip of the brush in the paint. Wipe the paint on a paper towel or palette or whatever, repeatedly, until almost all of the paint is wiped off... then carefully brush the figure, brushing OPPOSITE the detailing -- you want the paint on the UPPER parts, not the cracks and crevices.

If the paint streaks or clots, you may have too much on the brush, or the paint may be too thick. If it tends to want to run into the crevices, the paint is too thin. Practice makes perfect, here.

For more information, with illustrations, click HERE! (http://groups.msn.com/DrBedlamsKitbashLaboratory/paintingtricks.msnw)

[Spiritual_Ex]

This is an awesome technique that can produce relatively good results with relatively little effort. I don't use it anymore (with a few exceptions), but that's mainly because I'm going for a different look in my minis these days. Be warned, it takes a little while to get used to drybrushing, so pick up a few minis just for practice. You'll likely get "muddy" looking results initially, but don't let is discourage you. THe key is to use very little paint, you can always add more, but taking it off is alot harder. Once you've got it worked out you can build up successive layers of color, lightening as you go, to really get some nice shadow/highlight effects. And it really is quite fast.

Good luck!

[noriaki_kakyou]

Well, here's the jist. A good drybrushing will complete the details of chainmail, give a tint to clothing, and gently put lighter shades where there needs to be (like gray on a beard or a white dusting of light on pants or a shirt).

I drybrush a lot. I learned it for the Warhammer figs I paint, and I use it when I "clean-up" my clix figures.

Here's the technique in a nutshell. Put a light amount of paint on a brush. It should usually be a lighter shade of what you used before, although I am quite fond of 'dusting' my figure with a light drybrush of white at the end.

Next, get a paper towel and wipe the paint off until you cannot see the paint comiing off of the brush anymore (some will still be there... just not a lot, and that's what you want).

Then drag the brush gently over the area you want to drybrush (let's say armour). The ridges of the figure will grab remaining paint from the brush. VOILA! Drybrushing.

For armour, I usually paint the armour black, and then drybrush metal. Looks great. Pants, I paint a dark brown and drybrush a lighter brown, and then a dusting of white or tan. (I use a wash usually, but if I didn't have wash ((I would make it)) I would do this).

Give it a try. One of the figures I have seen drybrushed out of the box was Constrictor's coils, Grod's fur as well as the white on the Weather Wiz's cloud.

Noriaki Kakyouin
CGNH- Judge name