Because I was getting wild, looking up the latest world ending apocalypses on Twitch for the last post, now my phone thinks I give a shit that this incomprehensibly rich motherfucker doesn't like some other incomprehensibly rich motherfucker. When you watch Twitch, you're watching the cameras installed at some kind of psychotic daycare. You see videos sometimes where streamers are trying to finally manufacture some kind of work-life balance at incredible personal cost, and the only thing that distinguishes them from traditional hostage videos is the nice camera. It doesn't seem like a nice place or even a good job.
Once we wrapped up that Kill Team: Into The Dark project for Games Workshop, I found that I'd entered some kind of gear with painting and I couldn't stop. It's always been a gruesome labor that even Slap Chop - to say nothing of Slap Chop 2.0 - could really do anything to ameliorate. But painting the same terrain for something like two weeks straight just to get it done for the stream broke something inside my skull and now I can't stop doing it.
I'm not incredible at it or anything, I'm not here to take your painting to "the next level." That's not me. I'm here to encourage you to get you into your backlog transforming gray plastic into martial paragons. The main thing I learned is that you don't have to be any good at painting to make a miniature look good. The miniature already looks good, that's why you bought it. Literally all you need is a couple decent - not even insane, but decent - brushes, a puck of The Master's brush soap, and a wet palette.
These are all quite normal things, but the reason I am mentioning them is because it may be that you were under the same delusion I was, which is this: that these functional, time saving, quality improving tools are for better painters than you are. When you've "earned" them or something. No, these are actually baseline things. You need a brush that is made from real materials and can make a fine point so that the model's details will paint themselves. You need soap so you can take care of those brushes so you don't have to buy new fuckin' brushes all the time. And the wet palette - something you can buy or easily make - improves your workflow by letting you have multiple paints ready, while also letting you pause and come back the next day by keeping paints fresh.
Mr. Mark Setter and Mr. Mark Softer, two technical goos from Japan reknowned in the gunpla community, will take the regular-ass decals you got in the box and make them look like you painted them onto the model. The first goo gives you time to place it exactly where you want, and you can always put some more on. This does not have to be a source of anxiety in any way. And the second one makes it lay super flat on curved surfaces. You're gonna get the cosign from your friend who can paint, and not the regular one - the one that had the nod and the slight frown, like that computer kid.
My hand doesn't just shake, it essentially waves - like a flag in a strong breeze. You can put a mini on a painting handle or even just on a cork with some putty on it, just try to maintain a few points of contact. Have your base paint around to tighten things up because you're probably not gonna do it right the first time and nobody's gotta know about that. Plus it is okay. It's okay! Here's a thread of the most recent project, the six model Phobos Strike Team from the Kill Team Moroch box. It didn't even take very long, and I had fun the whole time because I wasn't trying to do it on hard mode trying to apply paint with sticks or rocks or a bird skull or some shit.
Okay, NOW I'm done. On the occasion of their first #warhammer victory:
— Tycho Brahe (@TychoBrahe) September 26, 2022
Leonid Vesta pic.twitter.com/0kQTN49rGR
(CW)TB out.
