Simple, easy guide to spray painting miniatures. (And how not to screw up!)

A no-nonsense, simple and easy guide to spray painting and how to avoid common mistakes.

There is a moment before you spray paint something, be it a miniature or piece of scenery, where you know you haven’t "got this", and are about to screw up in a really bad way.

Do not despair, help is here!

Spray painting your miniatures with an undercoat is an important yet terrifying step. It saves countless hours and improves the look of your painting a thousandfold. One false step however and you have ruined your miniature beyond recovery! Well, maybe not that bad but it won't look quite as good as it could.

What kind of spraypaint to use? Most retailers sell cans of spray paint. The ones you want are labeled acrylic paint. They all have slightly different finishes and although the more expensive ones tend to be slightly better, the difference is tiny.

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Safety

Obviously nobody wants to accidentally spray paint their own table, so put down some cardboard in a well ventilated area and be careful as the spray always goes further than you think.

spraying outside is best, but avoid windy days, as spray paint blowing back into your eyes is deeply unpleasant!

The Method You know that story with some thief breaking and entering the house of three innocent bears? basically it follows the rigid triple structure of that lunatic's eating habits.

1) Too far away

It will look sandy, grainy and disgusting. The paint dries in the air and lands as little clumps. This can actually be a useful technique if you want to create this kind of gravely surface texture, but for anything else, awful. 2) Too close or too long

The miniature weeps tears of paint in horror. Too much wet paint clogs up the details of the model and is a nightmare to deal with.

3) About 12 inches away

Just right!

Apply the paint in short controlled bursts. When you spray, it's difficult to actually see what's going on, so spray for a second, check then spray again. Move the cone of spray over the model and avoid spraying for too long in one spot.

It should be like you are stroking the paint on.

One final point : Colour Here is a rule of thumb for colour.

Use white.

That's it!

You can paint any colour on a white undercoat and it will look vibrant and delightful. If you want it to look darker add a wash(paint thinned with water). If you paint on a black undercoat all colours will look horrible and dark. Want to make it lighter? Good luck, and have fun trying to painstakingly paint on ten layers of yellow, each layer looking worse as it swamps the tiny details of your miniature, and each layer bringing you closer to demented rage and shrieking madness!

Maybe that's just me. Anyway, you can use colour sprays on big models that you want to be that colour, but for small miniatures white is the way.

Even black looks better painted on white!

With your undercoat done, onwards! It's time to paint! Here is our easy 5 minute guide to painting.