Zoxe 101: Standard Colors II - Shades of Gray

As time goes on, the tools and methods we use continue to evolve.  Sometimes it's a desire to try some new trick you read or saw, or sometimes it's a desire to try a different product to see what the fuss is about.

With every project, however, there seems to be a set of colors that you just can't get away from.  In Zoxe 101, I'm talking about tools/items/colors that find their way into virtually every project.

This time, we're talking again about paint.  Let's get some 'boring' content out of the way with some grays.

Shades of gray.  Or Grey.

I'm not going to bulletize and break down each color like I did in the first post.  I bought this progression of neutral grays from Reaper while getting ready for my Dropfleet army, and began swapping these colors and retiring other options I had on the rack.

I don't use the full progression of all 5 colors on every model.  Instead, I grab the specific shade that I'm after.  For a airbrushed gradient (graydient, bwhahaha, ... er, ahem), I'm probably going to start with AP Necromancer Cloak (see first post) and then work up through Cloudy and Rainy.  Misty becomes my higlight color, and Stormy (which is just a little brighter than Necromancer Cloak) can be a shadow or a touch-up/blend color.

I like Reaper's consistency straight from the bottle; it's pretty thin and doesn't require a lot of fussing/adjustment before you can start painting.  Generally I put it straight on my wet palette, wet my brush, and begin w/o additional thinning.  If I need it just a little thinner, I spread it out on the palette so it pulls more water through the parchment paper (greater surface area, physics is cool).  If that doesn't work, then I dip my brush in water and pull in a few drops.

I will say that while most of my airbrushing experiences with Reaper have gone well, the Rainy Gray seemed to splatter more than other brands when making an airbrush gradient.  Could just be me or my setup, but there it is.  There are ways to mitigate this (using less of a dramatic step up in gradient, adjusting air pressure, using a detail airbrush, glazing/washing afterwards etc.) but wanted to caution you; for my project the end result was just fine despite some initial swearing.

Some would say this many bottles of gray is overkill; you can of course mix your own incremental shades.  For single figures this is probably faster (and cheaper).  For me, having these bottles front and center makes life simpler, and allowed me to add units to my Dropfleet army (for example) months later much more consistently.

White:  There are of course a ton of whites on the market.  Not all are created equal.  Recently I've started using Reaper's Pure White over another options on my rack, and can say that I've had good results using it for layered details and highlights. I will say that for the airbrush, I'd actually favor Liquitex Titanium White Ink, but that's the topic of a future post.