Painting Minis - A Return

It's been a while since I've tried painting minis.  I'm feeling up to trying again after the past few years, but I am not jumping into a difficult figure right away.  Since this will be photo heavy, I'm placing things below the break.

For my first attempt, I'm trying a simple miniature - a grave stone.  Mostly one colour, accuracy isn't needed, and simple surfaces.

The potentials, Dungeon Essentials from Arcana Creations.  (photo by author)

The above photo is after cleaning them minis in soapy water, to prep them for priming.  I'm only doing the three grave stones in the foreground.  The statue has a more complex surface, and I may want to find a proper colour for it.  The fourth grave stone I have an idea for, but I need to see how things work out.

Ready for priming.

I'm not using a spray primer yet.  That may come once the snow has gone, so June.  I'm using three different "primers" (in reality, different acrylic paints that I'm using for the base coat).  I want to see the effects of the different shades as primer.

Post-primer, still drying.

Close up for the details.

The priming came out as I expected.  The black looked a little thick until it dried out, so no details lost there.  The simpler surface - flat, wide, no folds - made painting each one quick.  I used a wash for each one, water with the acrylic paint.

A day later.

I started thinking of using three different colours of grey, to go for different types of stone, then decided otherwise.  Using the same shade of grey, Castle Grey, I wanted to see the differences on each of the primers.  The white, though, could work for the statue to make it look like marble.

After painting.

There is definitely a difference between the white-primed and the black-primed grave stone once painted.  I should be able to prime a mini two (or more) different colours to get an effect I want, that is, a lighter tone amongst darker ones.

Once I got the graves painted, I realized I don't have a paint the colour of the ground the stones are one  I'll have to fix that this week, so the minis will stay in this state until then.

I'm happy with the results.  For the first time painting minis in a long time, things are working out the way I want or going in a direction that I like.