How to paint white good

[TripleBackflip]

Hello everyone!

I hope you're all doing well, I have come for some advice, I hope you have some to share.

I recently painted many plastic Daleks, some of them were painted in white and gold, like those from the Eighties story: "Remembrance of the Daleks"

Here's how they look.

Mine didn't turn out as well


Do you have any advice on how to make the white appear smoother? Is it a simple case of adding an extra layer of white?

Thanks.

[Belgian]

Think the easiest way would be a white undercoat (spraycan) or multiple layers of thin white layers by brush until there is a solid color and then painting on the other colors. Might want to wash the white with a greyish wash although I have never actually tried that myself on white.

[Historiker]

I am not an especially acquired painter but as someone facing painting a ton of Imperial Assault Stormtroopers I found this helpful:

Prime with White Vallejo Surface Primer, then give it a coat of Apothecary White contrast paint, then dry brush with Vallejo White with a make up brush.

Would first try it out on a mini you don't particularly fancy though 

[Historiker]

PS: For the hard-white-armor effect (like Stormtroopers in StarWars) I would coat the bits of the white armor with Gloss Varnish.

[Keith]

No two ways about it - white needs a bit of time and patience. Definitely helpful if you can use an (ideally sprayed) white undercoat too. White will show up surface imperfections more than most colours so if paitning by hand then multiple thin layers is the way to go.

[Westfalia Chris]

I don't have a full squad of the Imperials, but last year, I painted up the specialists set from Warlord Games, including the special weapons Dalek from "Remembrance" (cf. the image attached below).

As stated by the others, I'd strongly suggest using a white primer spray (Army Painter worked very well for me). Using black or grey primers as a base for white causes, at the very least, a huge amount of work, if you can get it to look decent at all.

On that, I shaded the whole thing with a very light, warm grey, such as Vallejo Model Color Deck Tan with a tiny amount of VMC Smoke (a brown-ish glaze/wash), thinned down quite a bit to provide just some definition around the sensor globes. The main contrast is achieved on the gold and steel metals, which are painted on using darker brass and steel tones, then shaded using brown and dark grey washes, then touched up using bright brass and lighter steel and silver tones.

The white will need some retouching, most likely. As Keith said, it is one of the most unforgiving colours to paint on miniatures. I'm still planning to paint a squad of the Imperials (got a bunch of War-era / Renegade grays already done), but haven't got around to procuring the minis so far.

[Malebolgia]

I'm really a big fan of Vallejo Model Colour Deck Tan as a base for white. It covers well and has a nice soft tone, perfect to highlight over with pure white.

[Michi]

I cheated with painting pure white and than adding a dirty war battered wash… 

[Westfalia Chris]

I'm really a big fan of Vallejo Model Colour Deck Tan as a base for white. It covers well and has a nice soft tone, perfect to highlight over with pure white.

It's wonderful, isn't it? Perfectly suited for 1970s-80s computer casings on its own, too. Possibly the best "warm light grey" that I ever worked with.

[Malebolgia]

Jup, it's fantastic. The warm colour is perfect as base coat and it's a great highlight colour too.

[Sir_Theo]

I like to use a very very pale grey, and highlight up to white 

For a quick method (I used it on some Star Saga board game things) a white undercoat spray and the GW white contrast paint works fairly well.

[SotF]

A white armor look is something I've done okay with in the past. Though, I tend to make the end result more war torn in appearance...both Stormtroopers and some Elves, though the elves are a lot less battered looking., which may be more of the rest of the mini making them easier to miss the issues rather than the dark grey/black that Stormies tend to have.

White cloth is easier for me than the armor...especially the warmer white compared to a cooler white for it, though I've done both.

[Anatoli]

I paint white in one of two ways. Either with a black basecoat if I want high contrast white with grey layers, or dark brown basecoat if I want more cream white color.

In case of painting useing a black undercoat, I gradually add more grey and white, until the final highlights are made with pure white.

In case of painting using dark brown undercoat I transition intobrown, khaki, bone white and pure white for the final highlight layer.

Bot methods require many layers, usually between 6-7 to get a smooth and good cover.

[Mako]

A number of choices really.

White primer works, obviously, but a light gray primer shouldn't be overlooked either, especially if you want some tonal differences, like with clothes that have folds in them, etc.

A lot of people that paint white use darker colors underneath, and then thin layers of more progressively pure white over that, in order to give the minis some depth to the paint work/fabric.

I agree, for stormtroopers, a gloss, or satin coat over their armor would look good.  Some people use white, gray, or black primer for them, and then adjust as needed, e.g. drybrushing thin coats of gray and white over the darker colors, OR, using a dark ink wash over the lighter primer/paint, in order to fill in the crevices appropriately.

It's really up to you, and which technique(s) you select and prefer.