Your Painting Routine

[Xantige]

I'm curious as to how everyone here at the hive paints. I don't mean your techniques though, I mean your routines. Do you paint at a certain time every day? Do you aim to paint X number of models a week? Where do you paint? What do you use to hold your water? What's your palette? Do you watch movies or listen to podcasts or music as you paint? Do you paint wherever it strikes you or does it always have to be in a certain spot? How often do you paint?

Those are just some sample questions to get your guys' minds going. I want to hear it all. I'm curious if we all have something in common that we do and we don't even know it!

Myself, I have a hobby table set up JUST for my model work, yet I always paint at my computer table. I have a daylight lamp on my hobby table, but I prefer the yellowed piece of trash lamp at my computer desk. I almost always paint while watching Youtube videos, usually they're either MiniWarGaming videos, or Minecraft Let's Play videos.

I put all my models and the current paints I'm using in half of a Ferrero Roche container (I love the clear plastic look), making it easy for me to grab that, my jar of brushes, and my yogurt cup of water set on my plastic white palette in one swoop from my hobby table to my computer desk. In the other half of the Ferrero Roche container are all my GW paints (I set the model tray atop the paint one for space and the effect of the models standing over the pots.

I USUALLY paint in batches of squads, but after slogging through 20 devilgaunts, the idea of large batches has turned me off, and now I'm working in small batches of 5 or less models, it's more rewarding when I sit down for an hour and have all my models ready for the next phase, as opposed to just seeing 5 out of 20 models ready for the next phase.

I don't paint at any certain time or for any certain length. I maybe get about 3-10 hours of painting in a week. The only thing I hate doing, is leaving a model half painted between phases!

[Scizor]

i have a hobby table just to the left of my table where i have my laptop placed. i paint when i feel like it and i paint the model i feel like painting. right now i have no goals as for models per week or so but, sometimes i do. i keep my water in a glass that i no longer use for drinking water

[killercroc]

I paint when I finally get bored enough, get halfway through with the model, and then never paint it again

I paint where-ever I want (usually my coffee table) and use a giant corner lamp to light it up, and I pretty much always listen to music on youtube, most likely something Nightcore or Dubstep.

Yep...

[Hive Fleet Cthulhu]

I paint a monsterous creature, then 6 troops after... rinse and repeat, whilst I listen to either music or audiobooks. If I run out a monsterous creatures... the 6 gaunts, then 6 stealers... so on in that order. I use half a plastic bottom for water (lol... enviroment.), and I use a plate as a pallet. Aw, yeah... we are getting fancy up in here.

[Evan Quinn]

Great Idea for a Thread Xantige!

Currently I Paint every Day. I started Painting when the New Tryanid Models came out and havent missed a day yet (trying to hit 3 months strate with out missing a day hehe)
Here is my setup of the room so you see just how much room I work with, having a work place to actually paint is CRITICAL. having a place where you can leave off and just clean once a week is a must in regards to getting miniatures done, the more distractions the hard it is to get what you want done.
Left Side of table:

Mid Side of Table:

Right Side so ALOT of space just to do mini's but i figure if you have enough space to actually almost assembly line it you can really get a lot more done!

Also another thing that can really make your life easier Organization!! Everything I've read about building armies if you have a good place to build and a well organized place to do it you can get it done faster and honestly who wants to prep everything every time you want to do some painting?! na, you want to sit down and just start doing it! Being able to find that bit, paint, tool, glue, terrain, magnet ect ect ect quickly and effectively just makes the entire process smoother.
Found this great bin at a home depot in my search for a way to organize all the extra bits from models, this bucket style case just rocks, can pour out the pieces find what your looking for and pour it back in.




Paint! how do you organize it how do you find it again!? theres just to many so where in the hell do ya put them?!

Did alot of random reading about that as well. There is a company that makes actual racks for paints but i found the cost ABSURD and sense they are way far away the shipping would be killer! So i decided to just go with a lazy susan with a 2inch foam block in the bottom to raise it. this way i can spin it find the paints im looking for scheme do my painting and put them back at the end of the night, easy to find and put away with out spending alot of looking at tops of lids trying to find the right color.


Batch wise I set a goal of getting what ever I plan on doing done in 1 week. Average of 4-6 Infantry, 1 possible two MCs at most

Music wise Han Zimmer set on pandora and sit back and paint.

Anyway back to painting!

Evan~

[albinoxeno]

just like scizor i just paint when i get the urge to. i either put a movie on and paint till that's finished for a short session or play like 4 hours of music for those long sessions.

Evan, not only do i like your colour scheme, base style and nids in general; i also like your taste in music. Han zimmer ftw.

[Hive Carnithrope]

I've been painting a lot less lately, but I'll get back into it soon.

I paint whenever, wherever, and, until half a year ago, painted on the floor! It killed my back so I finally got a desk! Much better.

I use an old jam jar for water and turpentine (for oil paints) and either the old table cloth I paint on, or blister packets, as a pallet.

I usually just have the TV on, mostly for the noise.

[Dro]

My routine:

Me: Oh boy all this free time! What should I do? I know I'll paint some hive guard.

Three weeks later:

Friend: Hey you paint those models yet?

Me: Wtf is painting?

[squidrog]

paint? me, only on breaks such as spring, summer, thanksgiving and winter

[Illithid]

I paint in my holidays (which I get every 10 weeks - awesome Job!!!) and will paint 2hrs whenever I sit down, which is most days. When working, I aim for an hour minimum if I find the time to paint

I always listen to music when painting and usually only paint 2-3 models at a time (small troop like ones) or 1 x larger model (warriors or bigger), I find the feathering does my head in if I do any more.

[Icepick]

My routine is pretty erratic and I'm a notoriously slow painter - after 6 years (with a couple year gap in the middle) I still haven't finished painting the vast majority of my Tyranid army. However, in June/July I've got a massive 16000 point 4 player game coming up, and everyone needs painted armies, so I'm currently trying to get into some kind of schedule! My current plan is to alternate between a squad of troops and a Monstrous Creature. Currently trying to do at least an hour of painting 5 days a week, while watching various TV Shows. Going pretty well, so far!

[Bot]

I can never really put myself together to actually paint. However, when I do paint, it is because some of my friends and I agree on a day where we can sit and paint together. While we paint we mostly talk about list building and 40k fluff. All while we have music playing in the background. It's pretty nice like that. These days are pretty much the only days I pick up my brush. Random days I do feel like painting a Blood letter or 2 of some random reason I have yet to figure out of yet.

My palette? Old Pokemon cards I had lying in a long forgotten drawer in my desk. I've been told that all of them are pretty rare since they are some of the first released pokemon cards and that I could probably get a lot of money by selling them, but I do find they are working just fine as one use palettes, so I just keep.

[kalmbeforetheswarm]

I used to do the whole "paint a squad at a time" thing. Now I paint every day, every chance I get. My pots are all out on my computer desk, my pallete is a 4x6 piece of tile, and I watch Netflix while I paint. Working 70+ hours a week, that's all I can do. So about an hour a day. I paint whatever is sitting in front of me, until I pass out.

[Devil's Advocate]

right now I'm painting 2-3 times a week, sometimes more.
My routine has a lot to do with everything else I'm doing, so on the days I paint, I tend to come home, putter around the house, make dinner or turn on the TV and then set down to painting.

I usually have some unit (or group of models) out for me to just pick up and start painting.

My set up is either on my living room couch or at the game store, I use one of those nylon-textured cutting boards as both a hobby mat and paint palette in one. I use leftover paper napkins to dry my brushes and my water tends to reside in an old glass jar. I empty it out and clean it every week or so, or whenever I'm changing from a high-saturation color (like red) to a low-saturation color (like grey or white)

I've been working on a commission to paint vampire counts, so I'm batch painting blocks - the current project is 50 ghouls. I tend to spend the day on just one or two colors, or the base or suchlike. tonight will probably be all the bones. My plan is to paint two units for every special character or hero. Technically the 50 ghouls is just one unit, but it's so overwhemingly huge that breaking it into 25-strong units makes it much easier.

Next is probably the banshee, and after that a huge number of dire wolves...

[Covalent]

I mostly paint when a game is coming and my grey models shame me. No but seriously, I paint when I feel like it, I cannot really follow a schedule for painting. When I start to paint, I do it for like, 2-3 hours a day for a week, then I slow down and stop.