Tutorial - Basic Techniques - Overbrushing/Drybrushing

Following on from the last Basic skills tutorial (which can be found here) we were left with a Space Wolf base coated and washed to really darken those recessed areas (see Picture below)

This tutorial will introduce the first step in highlighting the raised area of the miniature, and this step is called Overbrushing, while often called drybrushing, this is actually incorrect as drybrushing and overbrushing share the same technique but differ in paint saturation.


Overbrushing will apply more paint to the miniature than drybrushing so will cover greater areas and thus is done first with a darker tone (in this case GW Layer paint - Russ Grey).



First of all brush selection is quite important here so ideally you should select a large flat brush with quite stiff bristles

Shown above is a fine example (in this case a GW Large Drybrush).

With your weapon of war selected (or brush as most sane people refer to them) you then need to dip the brush in the paint ensuring that only the very tip of the brush is in the paint, the less paint that you put on here the less you need to wipe off in a moment.

Wipe most of the paint off the brush on to a clean piece of tissue and do this until almost all trace is gone and it leaves next to no paint on clean tissue paper.

Now paint the miniature in large even strokes with a firm (although not heavy) pressure on to the miniature ensuring you reach all areas that need to be covered by this level of highlighting. The brush should only transfer paint on to the large raised areas of the figure.

Well done you have overbrushed the miniature the next step is to repeat this technique with a lighter shade again and an even drier brush and a lighter pressure (this would be the technique called drybrushing) to pick out smaller raised areas.

This can be repeated as often as you see the need to achieve the look you want just remember each time go lighter in both colour and pressure and drier. In this case I have used only a single layer of drybrushing using Fenrisian Grey over the overbrushing layer as this miniature is destined to be a plain tabletop standard peice and not a special character (After all specials always receive a bit more time and love).

This is one of the first techniques after a base coat most people should learn and can often take a bit of practice to get right (even then after years of painting it still comes out a bit wrong from time to time), but practice this one as it very quickly raises a novice painter into a good painter.

 I'd like to leave you with one of my wife's first attempts in to overbrushing and drybrushing, it's worth noting the different textures she has achieved by altering her colour palette, so experiment with color but for most of the time lighter shades of your base colour will work best.

My next tutorial will be Basic Techniques - Using GW Gold Paints