I have just started painting and this channel has helped me out so much. It is very overwhelming getting into somthing like this with zero prior knowledge. I never even held a brush before starting and you made it easier to pick up the hobby.
Best trick I learned from the Privateer Press painters for shading red is to use a dark green. Using colors from the opposite side of the color wheel often make for a better shade color than black. Pink being closer to the opposite side on the color wheel is the reason why it works so well.
I learned that a few years ago in a digital painting class. I always wondered how to do it with minis though, since for digital painting you can adjust flow and opacity to make the complementary color more "transparent" to give a better shadow effect. Maybe with contrast paint or more thinned paint?
at 4:51 the cat is amazing... and it sits and observes you...niiice!!! i use yellow ocher and browns that go towards yellow for shading..like zandri dust...
every time I watch a vid from you, I learn more and more about glazing and layering. Your knowledge is endless. Thanks for being you and making these awesome vids
Awesome vid! I will have to try these combos! For a grungy look I like to use dark brown for red and light brown for yellow. Brighter tones blue or purple for red and orange for yellow.
On yellow it would be nice to talk about alternative shading. While pink is a good, defensible choice that can look awesome there are purples that will also work great: It's just that we want to minimize the green component, as yellow with greenish shadows is almost always going to be looking like it's just a very bright green instead. The real secret IMO is not just how we paint the yellow, but how we frame it. Whatever dark things are supposed to be near it, give them a little bit of a purple shade: The yellow will look far more intense in contrast.
It also depends on the ambient light of where the miniature is assumed to be - if under an Earth-like sky in the daytime, the shadows will contain an element of blue, while under a night sky it will be more of a deep purple with a bit of dark red.
I've always struggled with figuring out whether i should paint the brightest colour first and glaze in the shadows, or start with the basecoat -> midtone -> highlights. Seeing this video have helped a lot determining which technique is best, based on what i want to accomplish.
Hi Lyla, Long time subscriber, first time commenter, first of all, I love your channel and your airbrushing videos have really helped me get to grips with a new skill. Anyhoo, back in the 90's, when I was a GW Redshirt (when we actually wore red shirts!), I used to paint the cabinet minis for the store. Everything I painted was primed with a Chaos Black rattlecan (it's all we had, or skull white, which I hated with a passion!) and I did "negative" (old-skool metal) Avatar of Khaine, I still use this technique to this day. I started with a black prime, then a very dark black/red, working my way up through about 9-12 very thin layers of mid-tones, highlights and glazes, to a yellow/orange, the transitions were subtle and smooth, personally, I don't find red that hard as I've done it for years (yellow is a different matter!), I never prime in white unless I'm using contrast-type paints and then it's generally over a zenithal prime. Because my Avatar looked so "different" it became the star of the cabinets. You can shade red with a chestnut ink or wash (it can add a bit of Grimdark) and edge highlight in orange, like my Blood Angel Terminator Librarian's shoulder-pad, it looks fine, great even, as an edge highlight with orange. I appreciate your videos and your skills, you explain things well (sometimes a little too fast and I can't keep up!), you really do deserve more subs. Keep up the great work! M.*
Seeing the glaze pull back from the surface, at 5:23, actually shows how thin you run your glazes. Thank you. I never could do the "skim milk" consistency.
I highlight red and yellow just normal. Most of the time with an off-white mixed in. The last highlights can be up to pure white. After that I glaze everything together with the yellow or red I started with. As yellow and red are so translucent they are easy to learn glazing.
Yeah, or you can just use a dark red then highlight it with brighter red I’ve also had successes adding black to the edges of red, gives it a nice almost graphic novel feel
as a blood angels player I can say with certainty that a lot said here really isnt that true, especially on space marines. the way to achieve an effective red is to start from a maroon, building up to dark red, muted red, red, scarlet, then a red- orange. red is still a spectrum like any other color, and since all reds are different and have different amounts of yellow in them, of course you can highlight red! a really good exercise to do this with is a space marine primaris backpack since it has sharp edges, flat panels, rounded areas, and areas of detail. you can achieve a much more vibrant red than starting over white will ever give you. No hate to the vid tho! I like the vast majority of the stuff put out, just as someone who has painted over 400 majority red minis I just have a different and I think simpler preference here.
Came here to say exactly this. Red is one of my absolute favorite colors to paint due to the depth possible just within it's sub-spectrum. Not sure why it's thought to be difficult, it's no Yellow, which is absolutely the worst.
When i do my Flesh Tearers, i start with Khorne red or burnt red (proacryl), generous wash of carroburg crimson, retouch the original red to brighten up where necessary then edge highlight with bold pyrrole red and then another finer edge highlight of cadian fleshtone or tan flesh (proacryl). I didn't think it was going to work the first time i tried it, but i read that recipe somewhere and tried it and it's good. Never really had a problem with red. Like you said there's a spectrum and i always treated it that way as well.
You said everything I wanted to say way better than I would have. I painted a massive Khorne army with berserkers and deamons galore. You can highlight red. I never started with white. I always started black then went maroon and then to reds. My highlights were redish orange to Orange depending on the model.
I always love how red looks over zenithal highlights. It may be looked down upon, but the Blood Angel's Red contrast paint is gorgeous over zenithal highlight.
Hey Lyla ! Great vid as always ! Learned a lot, especially about that pesky yellow :D About the red, what I started doing recently, is to do an undercoat of dark purple instead of black, and a zenithal of pure white. That way, with a red going up to reddish orange, I can keep a vibrant red and this creates more interesting shadows and purple being a cold color, the contrasts are heavier :) What do you think ?
If you can't get good coverage on those colors I would suggest trying heavy body artist paints. Those usually have better coverage than the dark colors of hobby paint. Quality artist paint is a game changer I strongly disagree about not highlighting red. Depth of color is real life comes from lots of colors. Yellow, and orange are perfectly acceptable highlights. Most shades and highlights within observation come from overlapping colors. Just like how green and turquoise is a great highlight for blue. Mixing white to highlight is a mixed bag. Yes, it gives a color more value, but it also cools the color. Mixing vanilla yellow works much better if you want to keep warm tones. I usually find some useful stuff in your videos. And I always watch so don't think I'm hating or throwing shade. But I think your advice to not highlight red because orange or pink is not taking into account how reflections are often a smattering of different colors
I've only got as far as buying an airbrush and some cheap practice paints. Yet I must have watched two dozen of your videos so far. Eventually i will make something but at the moment I'm enjoying the learning process. The story of painting red was a revelation. Yellow wasn't much different if I'm being honest. Thank you for giving us your time and knowledge 😊
Interesting takes on the shading - seen the pink approach for the undercoat before applying yellow. What about a mix of yellow and a low value of its complementary colour blue for the shading? Understand we get a 'greenish' shade but it boils down to how the blue is in value and its bias towards violet or green on the colour wheel.
For red, after non white priming (zenithal/black etc) under paint with a skin tone. Then paint red. You can do small highlights with a red/skin tone mix.
I've done yellow in a similar way but will add in brown for natural things, or black for mechanical things for a black/brown lining for the very recessed/darkest areas. This is done before applying the yellow layer and maybe even before the pink/white step. This extra step will add in more pop to the effect.
I usually paint red over a brown base coat, interestingly enough. I've not tried painting it over white yet. I usually shade it with blue or brown, so the method you outlined here is something I'll have to try. I'll also have to try the yellow methods you outlined here, as well--gives me an excuse to paint yellow more often!
My draw totally dropped when you used pink to shade for yellow. I am terrified of painting yellow so I always just avoid it. That gives me the confidence to try it at some point. Thanks for the great content as always!
I use reddish brown as shadow for my yellows and it works quite well. In fact I use reddish brown also for my reds. And for my oranges. I love reddish brown.
I have never had a issue with red. I will echo what others have said. What is great is watching the blending techniques here as they are really well laid out.
Thanks for this , I was about to do some Roman soldiers and this will really help with the uniform (my last ones came out ridiculous dark) . Great channel, keep it up.
Colour is relative and highly dependent on context. If there's a secret to it in mini painting it's that your mid-tone is what your colour will 'read' as. So, you can absolutely highlight red, you just highlight it with a different colour. I also almost never use straight white or black to change a colour's value, because it doesn't just make the colour lighter or darker, it desaturates it as well. So for red, highlight by adding yellow to your base red and shade by adding blue. You'll get a mix of orange and purple tones, but as long as your mid-tone is red, (and your mid tones should almost always be the 'dominant' colour) it will still read as red and maintain it's vibrancy.
Shade red with purple or blue for a much more interesting shade than black. And to paint yellow start with a brown base coat. If your going from black to white, use a mid grey in between. Easy. Not sure whats hard about painting black though, tends to be a high coverage paint.
If you want to paint realistic color shades, you always have to gradually desaturate your shadows. Less light not only means darker, but also less vibrant colours and less color contrast. So, if you really look at yellow objects in white natural light without any significant interference of color-tinted bounce light, the shadow areas look exactly like yellow mixed with a tiny bit of black mixed in. As soon as you tint your shadows of yellow areas with another color like orange, pink etc., you create a situation in which the shadowed yellow looks at odds with the rest of your shadows, which makes the yellow as a whole look a bit orange or another color, but not pure yellow.
The only ones I have ever had trouble with is Yellow mostly because I never had a need to do it. I find the other colours pretty easy, just about layering up with good underlayers of different colours. I have made a load of Horus Hersey Word Bearers and they look great with lots of subtle differences in shading, highlights etc... when you get in on them. Thin layers is always the way to go.
I paint white by priming them white, airbrushing apothecary white contrast and then brushing on the white over everything but the recesses, it leaves it as a VERY light grey so it can still be highlighted instead of pure white
Been spending the past three days too scared to try highlighting red areas on a model I’m working on so this could not have come a better time. Another great video!
The best prime for WE is black, base coated with dark red is best when shaded with pure black and brown, while highlighted with a lighter red, it also works better for the trim as red is the best color to base coat warm gold with
You can highlight red, you just use something like Vallejo Sunny skin tone or Citadel Kislev flesh to go söightly into the pink and switch over to using Ice Yellow or Ivory (Pallid Wych Flesh works too) for the next highlight. That will settle the hoghlight in-between looking orange and pink, amd just kinda... Pale red. Its like when i learned to use a pale grey to highlight my purple to keep them from looking chalky. Weird but it does the trick.
I am just starting my journey, but since you say that red is translucent & that you cannot highlight red, would it make sense to put your shading down first & then red on top? (I'm only 4 minutes in so maybe you cover that later, but I am good at forgetting to comment once the video is over.)
isn't that the point of the "solid colour" contrasts we are getting now though? Not that the methods mentioned are bad but i thought for sure we were going to see the suggestion you made reviewing the 2nd gen contrasts using baal red/bad moon yellow over white then shading from the recesses/shadow up using their darker brothers/complementaries thinned down.....
I've run into issues with red. The workaround I came up with is to do shadows in either green or purple, the edge highlight orange. Not super "red" but looks nice.
White cause apparently, I'm a masochist. Once i realized how to work with white and make it "pop" and not look chalky, I've found it really easy to work with.
Not on minis (I'm just starting) but with larger pieces like model cars & model flying aircraft, I've quite liked Createx iridescent red (it is pink when viewed directly, and is red off-angle.) It would probably never work correctly on minis, but I've yet to try.
Purple because purple is clearly the best colour. Simple 🫠 😂 But being serious my favourite colour is purple. I love how it can be cold or warm. I also love using some fluorescent magenta in the highlights. Particularly for capes/fabrics, it gives a super rich look that makes it perfect for character models.
Blue, for purely practical reasons: There's basically no such thing as a bad blue paint that doesn't cover enough, dries badly, or needs a lot of babysitting to get the pigment to the right spot. Easy to shade, easy to darken, and one can go in so many directions to make different blue things seem like different material. Want to make something blue, and make it be the 'neutral part of the miniature? Easy to desaturate! Want to make it pop, and call to the eye? Very easy to do too! No wonder Ultramarines are the default space marine chapter, as they are far easier to paint for some newbie teenager than basically anything else
As someone who paints canvases now and has grown a lot as a painter thanks to it, yes you can highlight red, looking back on my time painting mini's I realize just how little everyone knows, how stuck in the mud about some concepts and generally how far people are away from other methods of art in terms of creative liberty and honestly... accurate knowledge. Red's highlight is red-orange, not pure orange, it's a very subtle mixture of red with very very very little white AND yellow. The red in the mixture has to dominate and there's other factors to consider depending on the material, like for example is it cloth? the sunlight hitting a red flag could make parts of that flag orange or even yellow where holes maybe be depending on where the sun is. A dark setting would make a red flag not even red anymore. Metal would have different results based on whether it's glossy (reflective), matte (rough). Then the shadow depends entirely on which colour lighting is hitting the armour itself. purple? dark red? brown? etc It's also pretty pointless to do with the absolute crap that we'd paint miniatures with, you'll be trying to do something very subtle color wise with paints that are ground super fine, cheap, mixed with crappy cheap medium (except of if i remember right, scale 75 artist line and err kimera? even then scale 75 artists medium does weird stuff after drying in terms of darkening.) This hobby is more concentrate on making a buck off your love, effort etc than on giving you the best product it can, that's what seperates it from other media's, you'd use student paints to learn and even then if you could afford to you'd go straight to pro. You can tell the difference simply by how pricing is managed. A paint brand worth their damn has different prices based on the pigments used. A pyrole red is going to be a lot cheaper than a cadmium red. I'd say grab a bottle of heavy body liquitex acrylics or golden's ones. Or return to the roots of this hobby and get some good oils (no, not that ak interactive one's, if it's a product marketed at this hobby it's probably not worth it, go with something that actually tells you what's in the tube/bottle/etc) Like take your comment about red, being transluscent, made me double take because I've been using red cadmium heavy body paint for long enough that I forgot all about that woe (please please please please please please please please please do not lick your brushes if you use a paint with cadmium, to be fair with any paint, this hobby is a community of weird ass backward people who somehow think that it's cool and in to lick their brushes to save a second, they think they'll be fine licking brushes that have had pigments on them because no one has died after doing it for a while, truth of the matter is it'll affect you in different ways based on the pigment, but one sure thing is that if it's an acrylic paint, you'll be fucking your sperm count and if you are a woman you'll be increasing your chances of a misscarriage as science has discovered in past couple years. All to save a second or two over using a towel... Eitherway, I'm gonna blow your mind, although what is blowing my mind is how much old school information in this hobby has literally been lost to all this copy pasting the same videos that every hobby influencer has already done to death: For shadows, instead of darkening with black, desaturate: Add green to red and you'll desaturate. Add purple to yellow to desature it. You are welcome. (also be careful about the yellow, not all blues or yellows are the same, like there's two different shades of ultramarine. You have yellow green and warmer yellows out there, same color but you'll get two different results mixing in the same colors to them.)
I love mephiston red so much. My LGS was out for months because I kept buying their entire supply whenever they restocked. I have boxes of Mephiston red pots in my room. I prime in mephiston red and i go over with another layer of mephiston red. I mix mephiston red into every color I use to at least a 70/30 ratio or mephiston red to the other color. My varnish has mephiston mixed in for a tint. I base in dried mephiston red paint i scrape off the side of the pot. If any has the 2014 mephiston red Christmas mug I will offer you a lot of money for it.
I first paint iron oxide red, which is rather opaque maroon red, then I shade with a reddish brown, then I highlight with a pure red (the red from Kimera, but any pure red will do), sometimes ridges and highest highlights with scarlet. I am going to challenge myself more with yellows though. I avoid them now.
Caucasian skintones (tending closer towards orange, like sunny skintone) make very good red highlight colours! You can always glaze over them with red if you want to punch up the saturation afterwards:)
Never thought about these colors being hard to paint with. I suppose using white allows for fewer layers but I've painted red, even keep l yellow over black without a lot of problems. The paint was all dry though, I wonder if paint manufactures make a difference?
Here's a color theory trick: you can make shadows for red with the darker shade of complementary color: green. I know that sounds like sorcery but it works.
I agree on most points in this video except one. The brighest point of an undercoat for yellow shouldnt be white. The reason is the same you shouldnt use black to create a yellow shade. Most black and white paints use some form of blue pigment as their base meaning when yellow is painted over or with them there will be a greenish hue. Now this effect is far less with white then black obviously but its still there. If you use higher quality whites (kimera or quality artist acrylics) this effect is lessened further. However I find i get better results out of a bright ivory paint
Yellow over pink was smart I bet you can do the same with red over blue. I recently started experimenting with coloured shadows and highlights instead of black and white. It gives more interesting results.
Chootto matteeee. I am only at 1.44 and had to stop for commenting. I am an avid fan of RED in the mini painting scene and do end up using it a lot. I have never ever painted red over white :D What I tend to do is try to find the colour harmony I am looking for on the mini and painting with that in mind. What this means is depending on the scene I base red parts in green, dark green, or some cases even blue. All of these are really good shadow colours for red. So what I tend to do is paint the darkest areas and than highlight up to my "brightest" red from them. Green is the complementer of red - so it works in most cases. But for cooler ambiance a blue base is also wonderful.
Sometimes you're already using the brightest shade of red and there's nothing lighter that isn't orange, since red is made by mixing yellow with magenta. The problem comes when you're trying to get it to look brighter. This can only be done by lowering the magenta and increasing the yellow, but that shifts it to orange. If you add white, you're going to de-saturate the color, which you also don't want. While you may be going for a red-orange (Blood Angels come to mind), this doesn't work for a lot of red objects/things (blood, red carpet, royal clothes, etc.). To make it look brighter, you can trick the eye by contrasting red with a darker red or even purple, which is what this video is explaining.
I respectfully disagree on the red... I'm sorry but I always found it to be the most covering of all colours. A khorne red or mephiston red from Citadel, a Deep Red from AK... they cover perfectly in one go from what I've experienced. I feel like it's actually much better to base a reddish brown like Rhinox Hide, or a reddish purple like Barak-nar Burgundy, and then using the actual red to highlight that base. And for both Rhinox and Barak-nar, the best result is with a black spraypaint under. Khorne red is very covering so it needs to be blended or diluted and glazed, otherwise... it won't matter much what you basecoat your miniature with, it will cover that colour. It's a good dark red, still, and one can highlight it with mephiston or Word bearers red. And then pick your poison for the finer highlights. Evil sunz scarlet? Wazdakka red? Depends on how cold or warm you want that red to be. As per yellow... that's a translucent colour, definitely. I'm not a fan of pink or purple for shadows, though them being complementary colours makes it kind of an obvious choice. But I feel like the result is too vivacious for my taste. My recipe is very basic but I think it works and I'd be curious to know what you think. I use citadel colours because of the hue and consistency being ideal for me. Spraypaint wraithbone, base with averland sunset (it needs to be desaturated because the wash will saturate it), which admittedly requires multiple layers to be clean and consistent. Then wash casandora yellow. Then create a gradient by mixing skrag brown with yriel yellow, to clean up the shadows, make them deeper, more consistent with light direction etc. And highlights can range from pure yriel yellow to dorn yellow if one wants crisp highlights. This won't give very deep shadows, but that's where I suggest enamel washes. They're great for capillary action and because one can use a subtractive technique with them. They make life so much easier... a dark wash by Ammo MIG or a dark umber wash from AK will do the trick, mixed with mineral spirits. I know some painters aren't comfortable with a medium that doesn't use water for dilution, but... it really is just a psychological roadbump. Once you try it, you see how easy it makes life. Anyway, sorry for the long post. I hope this can give you some ideas or help. I'm not saying that your techniques don't work and I don't presume to tell you how to paint, far from me. I do disagree on some principles where my empyrical experience contradicts them, but I mean everything I said with absolute respect for your work.
I have a couple airbrushes and they are so gd finicky. ALWAYS clogging. No matter what I do. I have a badger and a couple cheap master airbrushes all of them are just so irritating to use.
I just want to say, for the record, my painting outfit is, and will always be, a Bob Ross tshirt with at least 3 different cats hair on it. Cargo shorts, unless it’s after 9 pm then it’s pajama pants, and Star Wars, Batman, or Captain America socks. Cat hair added by cats, liberally.
When i fist started with 40k I wanted to make an Imperial Fist army, but all the horror stories about painting yellow turned me away. This would have been super useful back then! It still is thankfully, as I begin a new World Eaters army
I do enjoy your channel so don't take this as an afront BUT some of us have the attention span to watch a video longer than 11 minutes and don't need a video splt 😊 Keep up the good work!
I'd argue orange is more difficult than red. With red, at least, you can get semi-decent coverage and always highlight by adding in some orange. (You just have to make sure not to use too much or else it BECOMES orange). Orange, however, is just as bad as yellow in terms of coverage and also has the same issues with highlighting. You wind up with this vague pastel peachy color that just doesn't work well.
depends on the intended effect you want to get out of the color. I don't necessarily use brown every time I want red. It can require a few more layers with ever brightening reds to get to the effect you want, but I like the effect that generates for darker reds. :)
I have just started painting and this channel has helped me out so much. It is very overwhelming getting into somthing like this with zero prior knowledge. I never even held a brush before starting and you made it easier to pick up the hobby.
I'm so glad! It's comments like these that keep me working hard!
Yeah, Lyla’s videos are awesome. When I came back to mini painting after a 25 year hiatus, her vids were a lifesaver.
Best trick I learned from the Privateer Press painters for shading red is to use a dark green. Using colors from the opposite side of the color wheel often make for a better shade color than black. Pink being closer to the opposite side on the color wheel is the reason why it works so well.
I've never heard of that!
I found this accidentally doing jungle themed blood angels. Prime dark green, zenithal white, then spray red. Chef's kiss!
I learned that a few years ago in a digital painting class. I always wondered how to do it with minis though, since for digital painting you can adjust flow and opacity to make the complementary color more "transparent" to give a better shadow effect. Maybe with contrast paint or more thinned paint?
I highlight red with orange (of a redder shade.) It's been pretty effective. Citadel Wild Rider Red is very useful as well for highlighting red.
Orange is a great way to get a vibrant red!
I'll use mephiston red, then evil sunz scarlet and wild rider red
at 4:51 the cat is amazing... and it sits and observes you...niiice!!! i use yellow ocher and browns that go towards yellow for shading..like zandri dust...
Wow! The red section alone feels like one of the best practical primers on glazing and shadow-midtone-highlighting I've seen. Love the video!
Thank you!
every time I watch a vid from you, I learn more and more about glazing and layering. Your knowledge is endless. Thanks for being you and making these awesome vids
Awesome vid! I will have to try these combos!
For a grungy look I like to use dark brown for red and light brown for yellow. Brighter tones blue or purple for red and orange for yellow.
On yellow it would be nice to talk about alternative shading. While pink is a good, defensible choice that can look awesome there are purples that will also work great: It's just that we want to minimize the green component, as yellow with greenish shadows is almost always going to be looking like it's just a very bright green instead.
The real secret IMO is not just how we paint the yellow, but how we frame it. Whatever dark things are supposed to be near it, give them a little bit of a purple shade: The yellow will look far more intense in contrast.
It also depends on the ambient light of where the miniature is assumed to be - if under an Earth-like sky in the daytime, the shadows will contain an element of blue, while under a night sky it will be more of a deep purple with a bit of dark red.
Burnt Sienna works as well for your deep shadow color and for doing Yellow NMM
@@verigone2677 Came here to say this -- the reddish base of Burnt Sienna is what makes the yellow shadow nice and deep. I use oil washes for this.
I've always struggled with figuring out whether i should paint the brightest colour first and glaze in the shadows, or start with the basecoat -> midtone -> highlights. Seeing this video have helped a lot determining which technique is best, based on what i want to accomplish.
Hi Lyla,
Long time subscriber, first time commenter, first of all, I love your channel and your airbrushing videos have really helped me get to grips with a new skill.
Anyhoo, back in the 90's, when I was a GW Redshirt (when we actually wore red shirts!), I used to paint the cabinet minis for the store.
Everything I painted was primed with a Chaos Black rattlecan (it's all we had, or skull white, which I hated with a passion!) and I did "negative" (old-skool metal) Avatar of Khaine, I still use this technique to this day.
I started with a black prime, then a very dark black/red, working my way up through about 9-12 very thin layers of mid-tones, highlights and glazes, to a yellow/orange, the transitions were subtle and smooth, personally, I don't find red that hard as I've done it for years (yellow is a different matter!), I never prime in white unless I'm using contrast-type paints and then it's generally over a zenithal prime.
Because my Avatar looked so "different" it became the star of the cabinets.
You can shade red with a chestnut ink or wash (it can add a bit of Grimdark) and edge highlight in orange, like my Blood Angel Terminator Librarian's shoulder-pad, it looks fine, great even, as an edge highlight with orange.
I appreciate your videos and your skills, you explain things well (sometimes a little too fast and I can't keep up!), you really do deserve more subs.
Keep up the great work!
M.*
Seeing the glaze pull back from the surface, at 5:23, actually shows how thin you run your glazes. Thank you. I never could do the "skim milk" consistency.
Great video and tips, nice to see your quality manager was keeping an eye on you and adding tips.
I highlight red and yellow just normal. Most of the time with an off-white mixed in. The last highlights can be up to pure white. After that I glaze everything together with the yellow or red I started with. As yellow and red are so translucent they are easy to learn glazing.
Yeah, or you can just use a dark red then highlight it with brighter red
I’ve also had successes adding black to the edges of red, gives it a nice almost graphic novel feel
as a blood angels player I can say with certainty that a lot said here really isnt that true, especially on space marines. the way to achieve an effective red is to start from a maroon, building up to dark red, muted red, red, scarlet, then a red- orange. red is still a spectrum like any other color, and since all reds are different and have different amounts of yellow in them, of course you can highlight red! a really good exercise to do this with is a space marine primaris backpack since it has sharp edges, flat panels, rounded areas, and areas of detail. you can achieve a much more vibrant red than starting over white will ever give you. No hate to the vid tho! I like the vast majority of the stuff put out, just as someone who has painted over 400 majority red minis I just have a different and I think simpler preference here.
Came here to say exactly this. Red is one of my absolute favorite colors to paint due to the depth possible just within it's sub-spectrum. Not sure why it's thought to be difficult, it's no Yellow, which is absolutely the worst.
@@RiftShredemption yellow sucks, because darker yellows look like absolute shit
Red has so many shades that you just pick a lighter one to highlight
When i do my Flesh Tearers, i start with Khorne red or burnt red (proacryl), generous wash of carroburg crimson, retouch the original red to brighten up where necessary then edge highlight with bold pyrrole red and then another finer edge highlight of cadian fleshtone or tan flesh (proacryl). I didn't think it was going to work the first time i tried it, but i read that recipe somewhere and tried it and it's good. Never really had a problem with red. Like you said there's a spectrum and i always treated it that way as well.
You said everything I wanted to say way better than I would have. I painted a massive Khorne army with berserkers and deamons galore. You can highlight red. I never started with white. I always started black then went maroon and then to reds. My highlights were redish orange to Orange depending on the model.
Thanks Lyla! I'm working on a Votann Squad that are almost all RED, these tips really helped
I always love how red looks over zenithal highlights. It may be looked down upon, but the Blood Angel's Red contrast paint is gorgeous over zenithal highlight.
Hey Lyla ! Great vid as always ! Learned a lot, especially about that pesky yellow :D
About the red, what I started doing recently, is to do an undercoat of dark purple instead of black, and a zenithal of pure white. That way, with a red going up to reddish orange, I can keep a vibrant red and this creates more interesting shadows and purple being a cold color, the contrasts are heavier :)
What do you think ?
If you can't get good coverage on those colors I would suggest trying heavy body artist paints. Those usually have better coverage than the dark colors of hobby paint. Quality artist paint is a game changer
I strongly disagree about not highlighting red. Depth of color is real life comes from lots of colors. Yellow, and orange are perfectly acceptable highlights. Most shades and highlights within observation come from overlapping colors. Just like how green and turquoise is a great highlight for blue.
Mixing white to highlight is a mixed bag. Yes, it gives a color more value, but it also cools the color. Mixing vanilla yellow works much better if you want to keep warm tones.
I usually find some useful stuff in your videos. And I always watch so don't think I'm hating or throwing shade. But I think your advice to not highlight red because orange or pink is not taking into account how reflections are often a smattering of different colors
I find Warcolors Ome Coat range to be the best coverage in yellows and reds.
I've only got as far as buying an airbrush and some cheap practice paints. Yet I must have watched two dozen of your videos so far. Eventually i will make something but at the moment I'm enjoying the learning process. The story of painting red was a revelation. Yellow wasn't much different if I'm being honest.
Thank you for giving us your time and knowledge 😊
Thank you I never tried something big yellow red thing so this is very helpfull, I am looking for the second video
Never had problem with red. It's my favourite colour to paint haha
Interesting takes on the shading - seen the pink approach for the undercoat before applying yellow. What about a mix of yellow and a low value of its complementary colour blue for the shading? Understand we get a 'greenish' shade but it boils down to how the blue is in value and its bias towards violet or green on the colour wheel.
For red, after non white priming (zenithal/black etc) under paint with a skin tone. Then paint red. You can do small highlights with a red/skin tone mix.
for the yellow what about painting a specular highlight of either very bright silver or a gold on the white before adding in the actual yellow filter?
I've done yellow in a similar way but will add in brown for natural things, or black for mechanical things for a black/brown lining for the very recessed/darkest areas. This is done before applying the yellow layer and maybe even before the pink/white step. This extra step will add in more pop to the effect.
I usually paint red over a brown base coat, interestingly enough. I've not tried painting it over white yet. I usually shade it with blue or brown, so the method you outlined here is something I'll have to try. I'll also have to try the yellow methods you outlined here, as well--gives me an excuse to paint yellow more often!
My draw totally dropped when you used pink to shade for yellow. I am terrified of painting yellow so I always just avoid it. That gives me the confidence to try it at some point.
Thanks for the great content as always!
I use reddish brown as shadow for my yellows and it works quite well. In fact I use reddish brown also for my reds. And for my oranges. I love reddish brown.
I have never had a issue with red. I will echo what others have said. What is great is watching the blending techniques here as they are really well laid out.
Thanks for this , I was about to do some Roman soldiers and this will really help with the uniform (my last ones came out ridiculous dark) . Great channel, keep it up.
Red is right on for the methods shown. I have also done pretty good red when using different shades of red instead of mixing darker shades.
Colour is relative and highly dependent on context. If there's a secret to it in mini painting it's that your mid-tone is what your colour will 'read' as. So, you can absolutely highlight red, you just highlight it with a different colour. I also almost never use straight white or black to change a colour's value, because it doesn't just make the colour lighter or darker, it desaturates it as well.
So for red, highlight by adding yellow to your base red and shade by adding blue. You'll get a mix of orange and purple tones, but as long as your mid-tone is red, (and your mid tones should almost always be the 'dominant' colour) it will still read as red and maintain it's vibrancy.
Shade red with purple or blue for a much more interesting shade than black. And to paint yellow start with a brown base coat. If your going from black to white, use a mid grey in between. Easy. Not sure whats hard about painting black though, tends to be a high coverage paint.
Nooooo. don't do brown with yellow!!!
👍👍 you made red and yellow look fun to paint 😃!
If you want to paint realistic color shades, you always have to gradually desaturate your shadows. Less light not only means darker, but also less vibrant colours and less color contrast. So, if you really look at yellow objects in white natural light without any significant interference of color-tinted bounce light, the shadow areas look exactly like yellow mixed with a tiny bit of black mixed in. As soon as you tint your shadows of yellow areas with another color like orange, pink etc., you create a situation in which the shadowed yellow looks at odds with the rest of your shadows, which makes the yellow as a whole look a bit orange or another color, but not pure yellow.
The only ones I have ever had trouble with is Yellow mostly because I never had a need to do it. I find the other colours pretty easy, just about layering up with good underlayers of different colours. I have made a load of Horus Hersey Word Bearers and they look great with lots of subtle differences in shading, highlights etc... when you get in on them. Thin layers is always the way to go.
The way you hold your brush at 9:50 is interesting. What is that called? I always hold my brush like a pencil.
I also hold my brush like I hold my pencil!
Aw great. The red over white. That had never occurred to me before. After all these years. Thanks very much. Well appreciated. Great tips.
I really like glazing agrax earthshade into the shadow areas for reds. It seems to work well, and it means I can be a bit lazy and not mix paints :)
I paint white by priming them white, airbrushing apothecary white contrast and then brushing on the white over everything but the recesses, it leaves it as a VERY light grey so it can still be highlighted instead of pure white
Been spending the past three days too scared to try highlighting red areas on a model I’m working on so this could not have come a better time. Another great video!
Any thoughts on priming Blood Angels or World Eaters with red? Or Imperial Fists with a yellow primer?
not a bad choice!
The best prime for WE is black, base coated with dark red is best when shaded with pure black and brown, while highlighted with a lighter red, it also works better for the trim as red is the best color to base coat warm gold with
You can highlight red, you just use something like Vallejo Sunny skin tone or Citadel Kislev flesh to go söightly into the pink and switch over to using Ice Yellow or Ivory (Pallid Wych Flesh works too) for the next highlight. That will settle the hoghlight in-between looking orange and pink, amd just kinda... Pale red.
Its like when i learned to use a pale grey to highlight my purple to keep them from looking chalky. Weird but it does the trick.
GREAT video. Your insights on yellow were indeed surprising!!
Thank you!
I am just starting my journey, but since you say that red is translucent & that you cannot highlight red, would it make sense to put your shading down first & then red on top? (I'm only 4 minutes in so maybe you cover that later, but I am good at forgetting to comment once the video is over.)
isn't that the point of the "solid colour" contrasts we are getting now though? Not that the methods mentioned are bad but i thought for sure we were going to see the suggestion you made reviewing the 2nd gen contrasts using baal red/bad moon yellow over white then shading from the recesses/shadow up using their darker brothers/complementaries thinned down.....
Did the Black and White follows ups to this come out? Want to do both paintschemes on my next Boys build.
I've run into issues with red. The workaround I came up with is to do shadows in either green or purple, the edge highlight orange. Not super "red" but looks nice.
purple is always the answer.
@@LylaMev if not purple, then the answer must be magenta.
I always appreciate how open you are about goofs--because that's human, and the folks who aren't open about their goofs...
Awesome video. Very nice colours.
What is your favorite color to paint and why?
White cause apparently, I'm a masochist. Once i realized how to work with white and make it "pop" and not look chalky, I've found it really easy to work with.
Not on minis (I'm just starting) but with larger pieces like model cars & model flying aircraft, I've quite liked Createx iridescent red (it is pink when viewed directly, and is red off-angle.)
It would probably never work correctly on minis, but I've yet to try.
Purple because purple is clearly the best colour. Simple 🫠 😂
But being serious my favourite colour is purple. I love how it can be cold or warm. I also love using some fluorescent magenta in the highlights. Particularly for capes/fabrics, it gives a super rich look that makes it perfect for character models.
not purple.
Blue, for purely practical reasons: There's basically no such thing as a bad blue paint that doesn't cover enough, dries badly, or needs a lot of babysitting to get the pigment to the right spot. Easy to shade, easy to darken, and one can go in so many directions to make different blue things seem like different material. Want to make something blue, and make it be the 'neutral part of the miniature? Easy to desaturate! Want to make it pop, and call to the eye? Very easy to do too! No wonder Ultramarines are the default space marine chapter, as they are far easier to paint for some newbie teenager than basically anything else
Excelent vídeo, Loved the tips about colors congrats.
Some people recomend mixing the red with a traslucent white like zinc white instead of the more opaque titanium white, so it doesn't become so pink
I have not heard of that!
I’ve always used orange for shadows on yellow. Never thought of pink but will definitely give it a go.
Let me know how it goes!
how do you like the angel giraldez infinity? do you find you have better control?
Now that I replaced the nozzle seal it’s a lot better!
As someone who paints canvases now and has grown a lot as a painter thanks to it, yes you can highlight red, looking back on my time painting mini's I realize just how little everyone knows, how stuck in the mud about some concepts and generally how far people are away from other methods of art in terms of creative liberty and honestly... accurate knowledge.
Red's highlight is red-orange, not pure orange, it's a very subtle mixture of red with very very very little white AND yellow. The red in the mixture has to dominate and there's other factors to consider depending on the material, like for example is it cloth? the sunlight hitting a red flag could make parts of that flag orange or even yellow where holes maybe be depending on where the sun is. A dark setting would make a red flag not even red anymore. Metal would have different results based on whether it's glossy (reflective), matte (rough).
Then the shadow depends entirely on which colour lighting is hitting the armour itself. purple? dark red? brown? etc
It's also pretty pointless to do with the absolute crap that we'd paint miniatures with, you'll be trying to do something very subtle color wise with paints that are ground super fine, cheap, mixed with crappy cheap medium (except of if i remember right, scale 75 artist line and err kimera? even then scale 75 artists medium does weird stuff after drying in terms of darkening.)
This hobby is more concentrate on making a buck off your love, effort etc than on giving you the best product it can, that's what seperates it from other media's, you'd use student paints to learn and even then if you could afford to you'd go straight to pro. You can tell the difference simply by how pricing is managed.
A paint brand worth their damn has different prices based on the pigments used. A pyrole red is going to be a lot cheaper than a cadmium red.
I'd say grab a bottle of heavy body liquitex acrylics or golden's ones. Or return to the roots of this hobby and get some good oils (no, not that ak interactive one's, if it's a product marketed at this hobby it's probably not worth it, go with something that actually tells you what's in the tube/bottle/etc)
Like take your comment about red, being transluscent, made me double take because I've been using red cadmium heavy body paint for long enough that I forgot all about that woe (please please please please please please please please please do not lick your brushes if you use a paint with cadmium, to be fair with any paint, this hobby is a community of weird ass backward people who somehow think that it's cool and in to lick their brushes to save a second, they think they'll be fine licking brushes that have had pigments on them because no one has died after doing it for a while, truth of the matter is it'll affect you in different ways based on the pigment, but one sure thing is that if it's an acrylic paint, you'll be fucking your sperm count and if you are a woman you'll be increasing your chances of a misscarriage as science has discovered in past couple years.
All to save a second or two over using a towel...
Eitherway, I'm gonna blow your mind, although what is blowing my mind is how much old school information in this hobby has literally been lost to all this copy pasting the same videos that every hobby influencer has already done to death:
For shadows, instead of darkening with black, desaturate:
Add green to red and you'll desaturate.
Add purple to yellow to desature it.
You are welcome. (also be careful about the yellow, not all blues or yellows are the same, like there's two different shades of ultramarine. You have yellow green and warmer yellows out there, same color but you'll get two different results mixing in the same colors to them.)
Thank you so much for this video!
I love mephiston red so much. My LGS was out for months because I kept buying their entire supply whenever they restocked. I have boxes of Mephiston red pots in my room. I prime in mephiston red and i go over with another layer of mephiston red. I mix mephiston red into every color I use to at least a 70/30 ratio or mephiston red to the other color. My varnish has mephiston mixed in for a tint. I base in dried mephiston red paint i scrape off the side of the pot. If any has the 2014 mephiston red Christmas mug I will offer you a lot of money for it.
I first paint iron oxide red, which is rather opaque maroon red, then I shade with a reddish brown, then I highlight with a pure red (the red from Kimera, but any pure red will do), sometimes ridges and highest highlights with scarlet.
I am going to challenge myself more with yellows though. I avoid them now.
Caucasian skintones (tending closer towards orange, like sunny skintone) make very good red highlight colours! You can always glaze over them with red if you want to punch up the saturation afterwards:)
Never thought about these colors being hard to paint with. I suppose using white allows for fewer layers but I've painted red, even keep l yellow over black without a lot of problems. The paint was all dry though, I wonder if paint manufactures make a difference?
paint brand makes a huge difference! I originally recorded my yellow using kimera, but had to re-record it because the kimera was too good!
@@LylaMev okay good to know. Looking forward to p2!
Gotta say the pink/majenta under paint makes painting yellow so easy you could just throw a contrast on and call it good.
Here's a color theory trick: you can make shadows for red with the darker shade of complementary color: green. I know that sounds like sorcery but it works.
The opposite also applies! You can shade green using red and it looks baller.
@@nekrataali right, any two complementary colors should work.
I was always suspicious of the yellow over pink thing, but seeing it done has slightly blown me away lol
🤯 I've not had art education, and never would have guessed pink would shade yellow.
I'm so happy I could help!
just watch more youtube.
I agree on most points in this video except one. The brighest point of an undercoat for yellow shouldnt be white. The reason is the same you shouldnt use black to create a yellow shade. Most black and white paints use some form of blue pigment as their base meaning when yellow is painted over or with them there will be a greenish hue. Now this effect is far less with white then black obviously but its still there. If you use higher quality whites (kimera or quality artist acrylics) this effect is lessened further. However I find i get better results out of a bright ivory paint
Yellow over pink was smart I bet you can do the same with red over blue.
I recently started experimenting with coloured shadows and highlights instead of black and white. It gives more interesting results.
Did part 2 ever come out?
Chootto matteeee. I am only at 1.44 and had to stop for commenting. I am an avid fan of RED in the mini painting scene and do end up using it a lot. I have never ever painted red over white :D What I tend to do is try to find the colour harmony I am looking for on the mini and painting with that in mind. What this means is depending on the scene I base red parts in green, dark green, or some cases even blue. All of these are really good shadow colours for red. So what I tend to do is paint the darkest areas and than highlight up to my "brightest" red from them. Green is the complementer of red - so it works in most cases. But for cooler ambiance a blue base is also wonderful.
base your red with a dark magenta and use something like maroon or a mephiston red as your midtone and highlight with a pure red
I was hoping you were going to show off the pink trick. Very satisfying.
Happy to help!
Wow thank you for this!
So like......why cant i highlight a red with a llighter shade of red?
Sometimes you're already using the brightest shade of red and there's nothing lighter that isn't orange, since red is made by mixing yellow with magenta. The problem comes when you're trying to get it to look brighter. This can only be done by lowering the magenta and increasing the yellow, but that shifts it to orange. If you add white, you're going to de-saturate the color, which you also don't want. While you may be going for a red-orange (Blood Angels come to mind), this doesn't work for a lot of red objects/things (blood, red carpet, royal clothes, etc.).
To make it look brighter, you can trick the eye by contrasting red with a darker red or even purple, which is what this video is explaining.
The best red coat I ever got was painting red over pink. Never would have thought of it as a mid tone for yellow though.
Happy to help!
how to you keep cat hair out of your models? I am having the hardest time painting without getting ferret hair in my paint.
I hate doing yellow, so this helps so much. Thanks.
I respectfully disagree on the red... I'm sorry but I always found it to be the most covering of all colours. A khorne red or mephiston red from Citadel, a Deep Red from AK... they cover perfectly in one go from what I've experienced. I feel like it's actually much better to base a reddish brown like Rhinox Hide, or a reddish purple like Barak-nar Burgundy, and then using the actual red to highlight that base. And for both Rhinox and Barak-nar, the best result is with a black spraypaint under. Khorne red is very covering so it needs to be blended or diluted and glazed, otherwise... it won't matter much what you basecoat your miniature with, it will cover that colour. It's a good dark red, still, and one can highlight it with mephiston or Word bearers red. And then pick your poison for the finer highlights. Evil sunz scarlet? Wazdakka red? Depends on how cold or warm you want that red to be.
As per yellow... that's a translucent colour, definitely. I'm not a fan of pink or purple for shadows, though them being complementary colours makes it kind of an obvious choice. But I feel like the result is too vivacious for my taste. My recipe is very basic but I think it works and I'd be curious to know what you think.
I use citadel colours because of the hue and consistency being ideal for me. Spraypaint wraithbone, base with averland sunset (it needs to be desaturated because the wash will saturate it), which admittedly requires multiple layers to be clean and consistent. Then wash casandora yellow. Then create a gradient by mixing skrag brown with yriel yellow, to clean up the shadows, make them deeper, more consistent with light direction etc. And highlights can range from pure yriel yellow to dorn yellow if one wants crisp highlights. This won't give very deep shadows, but that's where I suggest enamel washes. They're great for capillary action and because one can use a subtractive technique with them. They make life so much easier... a dark wash by Ammo MIG or a dark umber wash from AK will do the trick, mixed with mineral spirits. I know some painters aren't comfortable with a medium that doesn't use water for dilution, but... it really is just a psychological roadbump. Once you try it, you see how easy it makes life.
Anyway, sorry for the long post. I hope this can give you some ideas or help. I'm not saying that your techniques don't work and I don't presume to tell you how to paint, far from me. I do disagree on some principles where my empyrical experience contradicts them, but I mean everything I said with absolute respect for your work.
This is sooooo useful. Thank you.
Thank you!
Great tips for yellow!
I have a couple airbrushes and they are so gd finicky. ALWAYS clogging. No matter what I do. I have a badger and a couple cheap master airbrushes all of them are just so irritating to use.
I'm a big fan of painting yellow by painting it pink up to white, then glazing it yellow. :D
Always love the cat help...
All the yellow and pink made me think of starbursts. So I shall now refer to this type of shading and starburst shading!
I just want to say, for the record, my painting outfit is, and will always be, a Bob Ross tshirt with at least 3 different cats hair on it. Cargo shorts, unless it’s after 9 pm then it’s pajama pants, and Star Wars, Batman, or Captain America socks. Cat hair added by cats, liberally.
Huh! Never knew the pink trick, thank you.
Pink🎉 who knew........ huh. It really does an amazing job.
Thank you!
Red is really easy, just start from either bone, or dark brown, depending on the finish you want
When i fist started with 40k I wanted to make an Imperial Fist army, but all the horror stories about painting yellow turned me away. This would have been super useful back then! It still is thankfully, as I begin a new World Eaters army
Good luck!
Thanks🥰
Lyla's aesthetic and background decorations always made me wonder if she's a wiccan or pagan of some sort
I am not! It's just an aesthetic I have always loved.
Cardamom was doing a great job of helping!
Great stuff friend 👏 👍
Thank you!
I do enjoy your channel so don't take this as an afront BUT some of us have the attention span to watch a video longer than 11 minutes and don't need a video splt 😊 Keep up the good work!
there is also the issue that shorter videos tend to do better on the almighty algorithm
this is the correct answer.
"you can't highlight red because orange & pink", me, a chad apparently: "I will edge highlight my blood angels with pure orange and it will look fine"
alternatively you can add in a warmer light tone like ivory into red. it's still kinda orange-ish but nowhere near the pure orange I used hah
that thumbnail and intro are great.
Thanks! this is probably one of my favorite thumbnails.
I'd argue orange is more difficult than red. With red, at least, you can get semi-decent coverage and always highlight by adding in some orange. (You just have to make sure not to use too much or else it BECOMES orange). Orange, however, is just as bad as yellow in terms of coverage and also has the same issues with highlighting. You wind up with this vague pastel peachy color that just doesn't work well.
You can also use a brown base for Red, not just white
.
I think brown makes red look so sad.
depends on the intended effect you want to get out of the color. I don't necessarily use brown every time I want red. It can require a few more layers with ever brightening reds to get to the effect you want, but I like the effect that generates for darker reds.
:)
Have you tried mixing yellow and brown?
My first model is Jain zar. Looking at this video, I think I may have chosen the most difficult model possible to assemble and paint accidentally, oof
Is this video a Tool refernce? "Red and yellow are all I see in my infancy, let's me see"