VLOG: Gerry’s Zenith Lesson
October 11, 2017 by crew
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thanks @Johnlyons for taking the interruption with good grace, and for the lesson and tips for airbrushing, I’ve been putting it to good use to-day.
Looking forward to seeing what you’ve come up with.
I wish I’d seen this a year ago. Cracking tutorial gents.
Always good to see Gerry on the show. And well, timed, too. After all this time chugging away on black powder infantry I’m hoping to finally get started on my desert boot camp tank armies, so it’ll be time to break out the airbrush again.
I’m planning on trying it on my bootcamp tanks as well. Most of the barrels are drilled out now ; )
Oh, absolutely. Drilled barrels at absolute MUST – even at 15mm. Granted, at 15mm you don’t have to drill that deep … (Oh man, why does that sound dirty …)
Because this is Beasts of War and everything sounds dirty?
I have an order of Stynylrez coming. I’ve not used it before, but I am quite interested to see how well it self levels. From everything I’ve seen, this is the primer to use. I want to also try some of the steps that John has listed in these videos for some Deadzone Enforcer Striders. Sorry, John, I don’t own any tanks. 🙂
As for Gerry’s comment on high pressure airbrushing, Badger does make an airbrush sandblaster, model 260-1. I own one that I have used to clean metal minis, but mostly use to clean up old car parts.
You are forgiven. ..This time 😉
Who would have guessed that Gerry would be an evil red, COYB!
Other than that great video guys. Always remember that the accuracy of your gauge depends on how good it is, a lot of them that come with small compressors are not that good as they are just another part that can help keep the cost of the unit down. Most of the time you get what you pay for.
Germans all the way. But they had a spare Russian tank (or three) sitting about for me to play with.
@avernos you lucky one… having the Master so close 😉
But some questions: Why are you assuming the light from top down? Why not from an angle maybe from the rear? Could it work this way too?
For zenithing a wargaming miniature I would say doing a simple top-down highlight is the way to go because it gives you the best result form a gaming perspective. What you are suggesting is more appropriate for a display model, especially figures as you can use the direction of the light to focus your eye to the areas you want. Where if you did that to a tank that in a wide open field and moving around the table a lot, it would look more like the model has a spot light on it constantly.
@johnlyons thanks for this video like beetle I’m going to give this another try on some Enforcer striders.
Great tutorial, always helps to see this kind of detail about a topic. @avernos makes a good point about it being hard to find the happy balance with your own airbrush work – pressure, paint thinning etc is something that I know I struggle with. I could blame my cheap airbrushes, but I feel that most of the fault is mine 🙂
Just got to the end of the video… I’ll second the suggestion of leaving a few drops of airbrush cleaner in the airbrush when you’re done – just remember to clear it out before you add in the paint next time!
Also @johnlyons – I notice when you clean out your brush, you’re often spraying under the table – what is down there? If I tried that at home there would be a divorce before long! 😀
It’s like a big A3 sheet of thick card.
Fantastic tutorial guys, really enjoying your double team presentation style. I suffer from exactly the same issues with seemingly continuously having to strip and re-clean my airbrush after every other use, even with thinning, so more hints and tips there would be gratefully received.
Great work @avernos, will look forward to seeing how the BA Tigers come out, hopefully in a future video!
Great video, as someone who has an airbrush still in box ready to go this was particularly helpful for the those tips as much as the lighting effect
Also @avernos YNWA mate!
@halfmileduck I’ll second your comment. I really enjoyed this tutorial as it addressed a technique I want to try and showed some of the tricks born of experience which allow the rest of us to catch up a bit and get some minis painted better and more quickly.
Thanks all – brilliant tutorial.
a great video guys if your worried about paint the old GW adage of two + thin coats is always the best way to go building up the colour in layers blending all the layers together
That was great, between this and the scenery and tank vlogs I must get an airbrush. Is the a video where you explain your set up in more detail, what airbrushes, recommended paints, flow improver etc.?
Some simple ideas when it comes to gear and paints: Compressor: Must have a storage tank, moisture trap and pressure regulator. Airbrush: Preferably double action and gravity feed (I use a Sparmax Max4 most of the time or an Iwata Neo) Paint: Don’t believe a paint range when it claims you don;t need to thin the paint. Always add even a little thinner. You only really need flow improver if you want that “tint” effect on your paint, so adding it to heavily thinned paint will assist in giving you even coverage without the paint running and pooling. Last piece… Read more »
I love the way you paint John. Nothing fancy, what I mean is you have a set up like most of us do with paint everywhere and bottles of gunk littering the table lol. You really should do an airbrushing boot camp. Anyway thank you for a great tutorial and keep them coming please 🙂
Organised chaos is poetry 😉
I dont have an airbrush myself but I want to say that I really enjoyed whatching this video. I really liked this kind of tutorial where you not “just” show something to the camera but to a real person that can react to it.
Also John an Gerry are a really cool teamup. 🙂
Something else to look out for @avernos is bent needles in the airbrush – they tend to get bent mostly during the re-assembly phase – if they are, they still spray, but paint dries on the tip far more quickly which can be frustrating. You can usually replace these easily enough, but need to be careful to order the right part.
To add to this. If the needle tip is bent and you can’t find the correct part, just ensure that every couple of minutes to check the needle to help prevent that inevitable uneven spray or clog.
I see that you also primed Gerry’s Liverpool shirt black as well. Is it possible to zenith highlight that?
it’s fine the way it is son, move along 😛
There was a great serie here on BoW about starting with airbrushing don’t remember the name. I always try to get my paint to the same consistency as milk. I also heard that a air presure that is to low can make your airbrush clog. Also to much thinner can make your paint dry too fast. Use flow improver like John said in the video to make your paint dry slower. I use a soft toothbrush to clean the tip/needle while I am airbrushing to prevent splatter. Just some quick small tips that helped me reduce clogging of the airbrush
So could this be the start of a new series ?
Painting with John & Gerry ?
Top tips for tanks ?
The fact that there’s a master and an apprentice talking about a technique really does add another layer to this tutorial.
A few more of these and I will find myself buying into a new hobby, as I did with FoW:FTW …
Always been scared of zenithing. I always thought it was “Spray black undercoat all over then spray white undercoat straight down”. Didnt even think about doing the panels individually for the shadow effect.
Random question: Would zenething like this be the starting step to source-lighting? So if you had a mini of a person with a lantern and you wanted the lighting effects, would you zeneth the mini from the lantern out or will different techniques need to be used?