"Painting figures in black & white" Topic

Painting some Western figures yesterday I got to think. My favourite Western were black & white serials and early movies. Wouldn´t it be interesting to paint certain types of figures in black & white / grey tones? I´m thinking of classic western figs, Victorian SF, Flash Gordon, classic horror figs, 1920 gangsters, and similar which we got to know mostly through black & white movies etc.

Does anyone do that, know about special painting techniques, how they look on the table, has found / put any pics of figures done that way online?

When I was teaching my son to paint we primed his Mordheim warband black and dry brushed them white. They had a black and white feel. People called them ghosts and statues as well. Very simple and quick to paint.

LLC aka Ron

With anyluck there'll be someone who paints Hasslefree's Marv figure (based on the Sin City movie) in black and white but i don't think its released yet. Will have to wait and see!

Many years ago a friend said that if we take into account the actual height we view a game from above the table, the figures would only seem to be in various shades of gray.

That would have to include the terrain and buildings too. Same for the black and white movie games. Remember, they were actually color in life, it was just the film that was black and white.

You could paint in color and give players glasses that only allow viewing in B&W. Or paint everything that way, I would love to see it.

I've heard a story that someone did exactly that for a game at Historicon a few years ago. I suspect that information on that game will appear on this thread before too long.

This sounds like a difficult way of painting figures that requires some "outside of the box" thinking. Good luck on your project.

Remember, they were actually color in life, it was just the film that was black and white.

Not necessarily. "Citizen Kane", for instance was filmed on specially built sets with the cast in special costumes – everything was grayscale. I'm pretty sure it wasn't the only film to do that.

Here's an inspiring WWII diorama
link

And here's a previous thread on this topic – check out the posts by evilcartoonist
TMP link

I think it was Staines Wargames Club that did a western game based on Stagecoach that was all in shades of grey.

I have contemplated painting my Copplestone gangsters like that.

Mike

There is actually a painting technique called underlighting that uses this as an intermediate step. What you do is undercoat your figures a dark shade, overbrush medium, drybrush light. Then apply color with stains, inks or other translucent paints. So all your highlighting and shading is done beforehand.

Typically you underlight with black/gray/white (for cool colors) or dark brown/ medium brown/ cream (for warm colors). Before applying color, your figures look like statues or wood carvings. You can also undercoat white or another light shade, then wash (stain really) with a dark shade -- this gives a similar effect.

It's a very fast technique since you can load the brush up with stains or inks that flow everywhere, almost like painting with washes. The look typically is a little different than applying straight paint of the same color, so you don't want to mix these figures into a unit painted in a traditional manner. And of course if you paint on some details and make a mistake, it's harder to clean it up.

Great call-back Henrix, that diorama was the first thing I thought of. I haven't seen that in a couple of years.

I never believe that WW2 one ..I take the word for it but my idiot mind just can't accept it … it's just too good.

I suppose you could use a similar technique for a night action (I'm thinking WW2, maybe the raid on St. Nazaire). All terrain amd figures painted basically B&W, perhaps with shading on the buildings reflecting the light sources (the moon). It would be cool but a bit time consuming for a one-off game!

One thing you might want to try is to find a Black and white picture of what you are looking to paint and use that as a painting guide.

see Calvin and Hobbes cartoon.

link

That link to evilcartoonist was great!! what a cool idea

Thanks for the feedback.

After following the link to Evil Cartoonist at least one thing is clear: Painting in b&w is only an aestetic decision and not a way to save time painting. B&w paint jobs can be as complex as any full color ones.

I also liked the idea of using sepia tones instead of grey tones.

thosmoss did some really cool minis like this for some Vampire Wars figs. Maybe he'll see this and post some of his pics on displaced miniatures

If you have a digital color image of the subject you wan to paint, you can have your printer use "greyscale" so your reference will come out in black and white or what artists call greyscale which goes from white then gradually darkening in the 8 shades of gradually darkening grey until you get black. Or vice versa if you prefer. Alternatively you can get that same effect by just running a color photo through a black and white copier.

This is useful to canvas painters like myself in doing my panel of the Union cavalry charge at Cedar Creek because it helps you to sort out the dark colors from the light. Once you don't have t deal with comparing colors that gets wonderfully easy to do.

It might also help to get a smallish artists' color wheel. These will show on the back a grey scale showing the Black to white by way of the gradually transitioning grey colors and vice versa thing.

Hope thi helps and happy panting.

Look here:

TMP link

CC

It's an interesting idea.

I'd suggest checking with a large photography store to see if they have a reference chart for Ansel Adam's "Zone System". This celebrated photographer tried to obtain as many shades of gray as he could between black and white. He found that (including black & white), there were ten. Making sure that his prints contained as many as possible, the results were stunning. I see no reason it couldn't be applied to miniature painting.

Cheers