[JohnReid]

Bird or fine art colors.

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These are what JoSonja call their bird carver or fine art range of colors.
You may want to revise your color wheel to reflect these changes.
Cad yellow medium becomes Cad yellow light
Napthol crimson becomes Cad scarlet and
Ultra blue becomes Ultra blue deep
They have also added some new colors to their regular line.I picked up Olive Green awhile ago and use it a lot for the military colors.
You may want to consider this color for your first figures underpainting.For highlights you will need a yellow-white pastel like yellow oxide and for shade dark green.
If your figure has a leather belt and shoes buy a nice medium brown or red-brown for underpainting.
For flesh use a mix of burnt sienna,yellow ochre and white for underpainting.
Underpaint the rest in colors of your own choosing.

[JohnReid]

The secret is out!

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Well guys I guess my secrets are now all out.In review:
-use flat paint so your chalk pastels will stick to the finished underpainted surface.
-use chalk pastels for highlight and shade
-washes? fogeta-bout-it.
-dry brushing ?use to hi-lite the hair or other surfaces where pastels may not work as well.
-painting eyes? don't bother ,especially in the smaller scales.
-mixing your own colors? avoid if possible,use tube colors and modify them with pastels right on your figure.
Like I said ,easy and fun with guaranteed results .Now please take the time to practice and try to be very soft and subtle when shading or blending your colors.
Next I will post some pictures of my work and try to explain how I got there using my methods.

For details on surface preparation and cleaning your resin or plastic figures there has been much already written.
For our purposes here I will assume that we are dealing with a dry ,clean surface that has been properly prepared.(On a very slick or shiny surface preparation may call for a little very light sanding using 600 or higher sandpaper)
In keeping with our budding artists approach to painting figures lets start with an artist type base coat called Gesso.Gesso will stick to just about any surface and just about anything will stick to it.It comes in a few basic colors and I usually pick something that is closest to the finished color.Also you may want to use something that has enough contrast to the plastic to verify an even coat has been applied. Some artists that use a lot a transparent washes may want to use white gesso to give their finished surface more life.I don't like using white for my method because it can easily contaminate a finished surface with little white specks that are very visible and hard to remove.
I add about 50% distilled water ,(that has been treated with flow medium or surface tension breaker ),to my gesso.JoSonja flow medium does have a little varnish in it but the few drops that I add to a bottle of water has not caused me any problems.
Brush on your thinned gesso evenly and let air dry.Do not use a hair dryer here to speed up the drying process, as this may cause tiny holes that are difficult to paint over.Another thing about hair dryers,be careful not to hold it too close to the surface as you may cook it rather than drying it.2-3 coats of gesso may be necessary to get a nice even surface.Be super careful not to obliterate any detail on your figure. to be cont......

[JohnReid]

[flyXwire]

John, thank you very much for the most amazing amount of information you have given out on this thread. I might just try these techniques to painting my Eagles Edition Maj. George Preddy resin figure I recently acquired. I will post my work later on....

[JohnReid]

[JohnReid]

[JohnReid]

The Headless Horsemen!

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These figure were lit from above to create max shadows in the depressed areas.They were all basically painted the same.The hands- in- pockets and the hands-on- hips guys are underpainted with the same olive green color.I worked a little dark grey pastels into the low depressed areas and a little yellow oxide and white into the high areas.The browns for the leather boots , belts and jackets are tube colors and are hand rubbed for a dull shine.The laces were dry brushed using the same brownish color with a little white added to it.Metal boot and belt buckles and tunic buttons are painted silver ,to which a little black gesso has been added, to get a kind of gunmetal look.The flesh of the hands has yet to be finished.The hand - on -hip figure's tunic and leather jacket color has since been revised.Most of the shine that you see here was created by my handling of them.
Lighting is the great variable here.How much,how little and what direction it is coming from are all important factors.What type of lighting or mixture of lighting ?natural,incandescent or florescent ? are all huge factors.

[STARMAN 352ND]

Thanks so much for all this info....Color chart and all....Now lets hope i can do one of these figures .
JP

[hawkonevoodoo]

Excellent John, it is amazing how great these figures look. Thanks for taking the time to educate us.

[JohnReid]

The important thing to remember about my way of painting ,using pastels over a flat acrylic undercoat ,is that you can modify the intensity of your pastels right on the figure.If a depressed area gets too dark you can come back with a lighter pastel and modify it.Want to give more highlights to raised areas ,add a little white to the mix by applying it directly to the figure.Just play with it until you are happy.
Some have asked just how permanent is the finish? well it is a lot more permanent than if you had tried to use any other paint than flat acrylics.My figures are used in my dioramas, so granted they don't get a lot of handling once installed.But neither do figures on pedestals especially those in glass domes.Why would anyone want to put their hands on a finished figure anyway,we are not talking toy soldiers here being moved around on a board.My answer to the "how durable" question is durable enough for the purpose for which they were intended ,to be looked at.Hands off please(and that includes you judges)
You can do your own testing and I will bet that you will be surprised just how durable the surface really is.
As far as fixatives are concerned,I have never used any myself.You may want to give it a try if you think your figures really need it .Personally,I would be a little concerned about their use in areas of subtle shading.