I’ve been using 4 to 5 inch pieces of wooden skewers to hold my little people for painting,
I use a touch of Hob E Tac from Woodland Scenics to hold them on the stick and it works fine… on sitting figures but not so well on standing ones, especially if their feet are separated a bit. What is your method for holding standing people while painting?
Jarrell
Keep em on the sprues till painted.
That doesn’t always work, sprue gates could be on the arms or sides or heads. I often need to detach the figures to scrape and file away those ever-present mold-seams (next I prime the figure, usually white, and then scrap and file the seams I missed that the primer always highlights).
In general, I paint in parts so I can hold the top or bottom part of the figure as I go along (and I paint in lots, so gives the figures time to dry). I usually take a few days to do 10 or so figures, not a big rush obviously, and not continously.
All standing figures are stood on a strip of double sided tape, or more commonly masking tape sticky side up tacked to some stiff cardboard, to dry.
Figures in funky poses that won’t stay up (usually bent over, running. climbing etc) often get a hot pin pushed into an appendage where the hole won’t be seen (usually where the figure is tacked to the scenery or building or vehicle).
I also paint figures in stages. Most of the ones I buy are not on sprues, but when I do have them I keep them on the sprues as long as possible. I usually start with flesh tones. I don’t have to be particularly neat, because I will paint over collars, sleeves and such with another color later. I do shoes early on, too.
I use a very small brush, tweezers and an illuminated magnifying lamp. The lamp makes things so much easier.
This is my first time at this and the lot I bought were 72 loose figures, not on sprues. As usual, I’ve found, you’re not going to get 72 indiviual poses but rather only 7 or 8 different poses in the package. Painting their clothes differently helps disquise that fact. Thanks for the tips on hot pins and sticky boards.
Oh, one other thing… something else I learned… don’t spend a lot of time getting a 'first class’ paint job on a figure thats going inside an HO scale Overton type passenger coach. They’re just not going to be that visible from the outside. Save the best for the passenger station platform and streets … [:D]
Jarrell
For standing figures, I use the plastic caps off of pop/soda bottles or water/juice bottles. I attach the standing figure to the cap with a small bit of sticky tack (that putty used to put posters and such on walls). I have also used a wee bit of white glue if necessary (the figure just pops off easily when done). The round shape of the cap allows me to rotate it between my thumb and forefinger while painting, giving me 360 degrees of access to the figure. For a huge painting session of a mass group of figures, I have also used paint stir sticks and attach the figures with either the sticky tack, white glue, or even double sided tape.
Regards,
Don.
Upon a second look at that image, I’m tempted to say those figures that Jarrell has are Model Power, which IIRC are sold loose in a bag (I don’t think they’re the Atlas figures).
Yes, the figures are duplicated, even Presier does this in their unpainted sets, so one learns quickly how to vary the various skin tones, clothing colors, shoes etc. En mass, not much effort spent on customizing (e.g. repositioning limbs, modifying hair styles with putty, etc).
I’m trying to remember, there was a technique that war-gamers would use to finish dozens of figures at a go with less effort, doesn’t seem to be underpainting. Dang, can’t find it now.
Since it sounds like the OP has plans for lots of figures, maybe a good link would be this thread I created about keeping those 5/0 and 10/0 PRICEY brushes with decent tip points:
(Intra-forum thread beaming doesn’t seem to work for me, so here’s the link:
http://cs.trains.com/mrr/f/88/t/210665.aspx)
Well, my paint department uses hot glue to hold several on a stick at a time. That way she can apply one colour to many different customers at the same time. When you peel off the people from the stick you can also (if you choose) peel the glue off leaving it attached to the people and it works to hold the people up on the layout.
It takes the steady hand of youth to do the job.
Some finished ones before we were doing the eye’s and ear’s.
I always never could do eye’s and ear’s right. Then one day Lion mentioned he used cat hair as a brush to do eye’s. Now we have a herd of Golden Retrievers running around the house so finding dog hair wasn’t a problem. The dog hair didn’t work well at all. Then I thought AH HA! A dog whisker! So I used a method I use on the wife to steal some of her popcorn ( she doesn’t have whiskers) while she is engrossed in a movie. You sneak up on the subject and sit down beside them quietly, so as not to disturb their concentration. You put your arm around them and start scratching their ear. At some point you move your hand toward their nose and hopfully find a loose one (whisker that is). If you do she’ll never know you were there. If you have to pluck it or twist one out, you will be in the dog house with your dog for a good 5 seconds (these are Golden Retrievers after all)
The Victim, watching her favourite movie.
A person on the layout.
As for detailing the faces, generally when I’m finished with the painting I give the figures a wash of thinned black or india ink (thinned). This not only makes the facial features stand out but also the wrinkles in the clothing etc.
I glue them to scrap pieces of basswood or 1/4" lauan plywood with hot glue. This makes them easy to pop off with a hobby knife.
Generally, I have great success painting eyes with a 0000 spotter (brush). Many times, though, Idon’t paint the eyes at all, but a coat of black wash over the figure highlights the shadows (can you do that?) of the eye sockets and provides a realistic appearance.
I second or third the dark wash over the figure’s face without painting eyes or lips, especially in HO scale or smaller.
Indeed, recently I was in the LHS, looked at some O-scale figures with nicely molded faces, they just used a wash over the face and the figures looked great, quite realistic. Then I looked (close) at some Woodland scenics figure kits - these kits use painted eyes and lips, and looks cartoon-like close up (read: layout photography distance). So the moral of the story is - leave the hair on the dog and use a wash to highlight eyes and mouth.
As an aside, actually in many of those Woodland Scenic sets the figures are really toyish caricatures of humans, not realistic unlike Presier or other companies (even Bachmann’s not so bad). Shame really, as many of the concepts of the figure sets are really good ideas, but for some of them the actual execution - I took a close look at the Wedding Bouquet Toss set, and those figures would do Gahan Wilson proud.
As for painting the ears with a dog’s hair…why? In HO a 5/0 brush should suffice. Are you painting the ear canal openings?!? Hearing aids, perhaps?
Jeez… you guys do eyes!!! Do you paint the toe nails on N scale ladies too? [:O]
Only if they’re supposed to be Painted Ladies.
I just hold the figures in my hand and paint the top half first, and when that dries I do the bottom (if the the figure will have a visible bottom).
I haven’t had a problem with putting them down on my workbench to dry. I’m not putting on so much paint that it runs onto the bench.
I do wish the Asian suppliers would take a good look at what colours people are wearing on a regular basis. How many men do you see in purple suits for pete’s sake? Red dresses - one in a hundred. People with matching colours top and bottom - not that common in real life (except for business suits of course).
There’s my rant! Thanks for listening!
Dave
jacon12:
I always paint my ladies’ toes!!! That’s before I paint their shoes on!(no open toes allowed - railway rules!)[swg][(-D][(-D][(-D]
Dave
Maybe I should paint over this Woodland Scenics lady? Jeepers, creepers, where’d you get those eyes?
A very light touch of dark weathering powder will also bring out details, and darken the complexion of figures you’ve painted with “flesh” tone paint, which is quite fair in complexion.
Little Orphan Annie all grown up and with a kid of her own…
I’m not sure that the Woodland Scenics figures have enough molded facial details to get away with the standard paint & wash method of accentuating figures. I don’t own any (“Man no longer Free - Man get Pricey” - Crow T. Robot), but unlike Presier, Model Power [!], New Bachmann (not the 1960s Plasticville stuff), et. al, it doesn’t look like a lot of definition there (sort of like the old Plasticville figures - vague molded nose, mouth, eye brows, ear shapes - I’ve resused some of those figures for statues and mannequins).
I sometimes wondered what the person who paints the 1960s-era garter & stockings for Woodland Scenics “Hitchin a Ride” must have thought when first told what task they had to do (after a while I’m sure they think about anything except painting little figures). BTW, I couldn’t find out whether the WS figure sets are painted in the US (Missouri!), or “overseas” (including Mexico).
It looks like those figures have Taylor Swift levels of mascara in the 1950’s.
I don’t know how or in what country (why does this matter, unless it’s Japan where they have a fascination with overly large eyes), but those eyes are way too big. The left eye of the mother looks like it’s up on her forehead, too. He spot of paint representing the eyes is about 10 times the diameter is should be. Done right, the eyes should just barely be visible when the figure is held at arm’s length.
And for the record, I only paint eyes when it’s essential to the character, like an animal or fantasy figurine.
