Why are you painting?
Its a pretty simple question. Why are you painting? I am not looking for the existential answer? I am asking you seriously and honestly. Why are you painting?
The design process of how this landscape was made for Xor’Veil
Text has no tone… so let me ask again and assure I am asking in a friendly way. Why are you painting? Art has purpose, don’t think it doesn’t? All painting has purpose. Some of the time the purpose is just to give the painter a sense of relaxation, accomplishment or joy. So… Your question.
Why does it matter, why I am painting?
Simple, you have a goal. If your painting for enjoyment, just do it til you’re frustrated by it. However, if your painting for beyond the enjoyment of it you should be thinking about why you are painting. An author I love has a saying ‘Time is the currency of life’ with a none too subtle implication, choose how you spend it wisely. He does have a point though. Let’s say you are trying to get ten space marines to tabletop standard so you can play in a tournament and your spending 60 hours on them and not enjoying a single second of it… Perhaps I can interest you in the rest of this website…
Aside from brazen shilling, my point is this, you should paint fit to purpose. Let’s take a more neutral example let’s say you have just gotten a chess set, never mind how you got it, you have it. The only problem is that the pieces are unpainted. They are both grey. With concentration you can tell which side is which, what do you do? The obvious answer you buy two spray cans, one white one black or one ivory and one ebony if you want to be real fancy and spray away.
Everything exactly equal for zero confusion
If you want to paint to ‘ wanna be the very best, that no one ever was’ you can travel the land searching far and wide for every single technique under the sun. However, if you are a father of four, running a law firm. Dude… Check out the rest of this site! Honestly, your time is worth more than those 60 hours of painting those 10 marines! Okay… I will stop… but no promises.
The thing is that let’s say you are that guy, and no you don’t want to commission me, you want to paint your models regardless of how much teeth gritting and complaining and NOT throwing models across the room… regardless of how much you want to… Instead, get a colour primer, do some quick blocking and then dip that sucker. Dipping is a technique where you put on base colours and then literally dip the mini in this thing and then shake it off vigorously. A picture is worth a thousand words…
From the people who have been getting models painted quick for decades!
I have a very simple point here…
There is a correct answer to ‘Why are you painting?’ and there is correct advice that correlates to that. I am not trying to be a dingus and tell you what to do and how to do it. I am just saying one thing.
Time is the currency of life my friend.
….
Til next time keep those brushes wet.