Matakishi's Tea House
A simple little site...
By Jason Miller
Shiny Greens
I remember when I first started I would get VERY FRUSTRATED that my greens were never shiny or even smooth. I'm not talking about a finger print here, but an overall texture to the mini.For example:
Nice, smooth, and heck, you can even see it reflects light or looks somewhat 'shiny'. So how do I do that? Good question. First lets look at the tools I use to smooth:
GW Tool: Sold at all Games Workshop stores as well as in a few sculpting sets. Very good for overall shaping and smoothing.
Lobster/nut Pick: Found at any dollar store. Perfect for smoothing in corners and tight areas, good for hiding seams.
Burnishing tools: Found in art supply stores. Large ones are good for smoothing, small ones not so much.
Crochet hook: found at WalMart. Very good for smoothing around corners (edit- I finally got a clay shaper set at a local store- they were about $5 US each. These work the best for smoothing and shaping- I HAVE found that a pencil eraser does nearly the same thing).
Ok so look at the tools above, these all have smooth edges. You guessed it, the way to get those super smooth minis... you have to sit and smooth and re smooth and smooth and smooth etc. I find it best to work in a small gentle circle and slowly crawl my way over the area to be smoothed. Then I let it sit for 20 minutes and come back and do it again. The rounded edges mean that a slip with your tool wont put a gouge into your figure, just a small indent, which is much easier to smooth out.
I generally rough out a figure with the GW tool, then smooth it with the GW tool using the flat surface of the tool to skim over the green lightly. Then I use a clay shaper.
Can your green be too smooth? YES! In some cases you may want a slight texture to the figure. If you are layering the figure a smooth surface can be difficult to build on. In fact the Green Stuff may slip right off. There are two ways to solve this that I use:
Wet brush sanding: when the green is still drying I gently sand it with water/spit and a soft brush cut down to stubble. This gives a soft texture to the figure overall but shouldn't get too shiny.
Wet sanding: Green stuff can be filed, it just does so poorly. Get a very fine file. For best results you need to be GENTLE and sand/file in one direction LIGHTLY. I usually use water/spit as it seems to sand smoother. I also find that Green Stuff made with more blue is easier to sand as it is harder.
I remember when I first started I would get VERY FRUSTRATED that my greens were never shiny or even smooth. I'm not talking about a finger print here, but an overall texture to the mini.For example:
Nice, smooth, and heck, you can even see it reflects light or looks somewhat 'shiny'. So how do I do that? Good question. First lets look at the tools I use to smooth:
GW Tool: Sold at all Games Workshop stores as well as in a few sculpting sets. Very good for overall shaping and smoothing.
Lobster/nut Pick: Found at any dollar store. Perfect for smoothing in corners and tight areas, good for hiding seams.
Burnishing tools: Found in art supply stores. Large ones are good for smoothing, small ones not so much.
Crochet hook: found at WalMart. Very good for smoothing around corners (edit- I finally got a clay shaper set at a local store- they were about $5 US each. These work the best for smoothing and shaping- I HAVE found that a pencil eraser does nearly the same thing).
Ok so look at the tools above, these all have smooth edges. You guessed it, the way to get those super smooth minis... you have to sit and smooth and re smooth and smooth and smooth etc. I find it best to work in a small gentle circle and slowly crawl my way over the area to be smoothed. Then I let it sit for 20 minutes and come back and do it again. The rounded edges mean that a slip with your tool wont put a gouge into your figure, just a small indent, which is much easier to smooth out.
I generally rough out a figure with the GW tool, then smooth it with the GW tool using the flat surface of the tool to skim over the green lightly. Then I use a clay shaper.
Can your green be too smooth? YES! In some cases you may want a slight texture to the figure. If you are layering the figure a smooth surface can be difficult to build on. In fact the Green Stuff may slip right off. There are two ways to solve this that I use:
Wet brush sanding: when the green is still drying I gently sand it with water/spit and a soft brush cut down to stubble. This gives a soft texture to the figure overall but shouldn't get too shiny.
Wet sanding: Green stuff can be filed, it just does so poorly. Get a very fine file. For best results you need to be GENTLE and sand/file in one direction LIGHTLY. I usually use water/spit as it seems to sand smoother. I also find that Green Stuff made with more blue is easier to sand as it is harder.
