Be warned, this is probably going to be a rambling, stream of consciousness post. Plus I started writing it a couple of weeks ago now and have edited loads. Hopefully it still makes sense.

So, as you probably know, I print and paint as well as paint purchased miniatures and terrain. As part of this I watch many, many YouTube channels. Quite a lot of them tell me to do x or y to improve my painting. Some go as far as to tell me to try something new.

The question I want to ask is ‘why’?

Now before I start, this is a personal question and I am not telling anyone what to do/not do.

I have been painting miniatures for about 35 years. Over time have I improved… yes of course I have. Over those years have I tried new things, again yes.

I am now in a happy little groove, some may see it as a rut. I love my Contrast paints and pretty much use them all the time. So much so I have ordered a set of the Vallejo xpress range. So in reality I am trying something new 😉

Now what about this question. I recently watched Dave on MS Paints asking a question about why miniatures look terrible..

He made an interesting observation, if your miniature does not look like how you envisaged it from either the box art or your favourite YouTube influencer then you have a 180 degree shift in feeling from good… to crap in a heartbeat. I actually watched a video that auto loaded the other day it was a guy painting yellow and as we all know, yellow is a sod of a colour to paint. Anyway he did a close up and there was paint (shall we say) where it shouldn’t have been and it actually made me happy. It was almost like … Yey someone like me. I didn’t read the comments as I was actually worried the keyboard warriors would be in pointing it out.

I am of the opinion that good enough is good enough for what I want. If I entered competitions then I may feel different. I am an amateur, my painting style is that of an amateur and I will probably happily carry on in this vein until I find a different way to do things.

Just to show that I have made improvements over time, both of these were painted quickly for a game.

I suppose what I am trying to say is that to my knowledge I am not deliberately going out of my way to improve. It is happening in a more organic way. Funnily enough I have almost stopped watching painting videos on YouTube.

I am actually in awe of the skill of some people. They take the same amount of time to paint an arm as I take to paint a squad (or possibly an army). The final miniature is exquisite whereas mine are definitely at the other end of the scale… I go for the one metre rule… or maybe ten metres with 28mm.

So if you have got to the end of this, you deserve a medal.

9 thoughts on “Do I Need to Improve?”

  1. Well M I did get to the end of it and I totally agree with you. A great post and by the way I like your painting!

    Those of you who have read my blog will know that I paint very quickly. This is great but it is at a price. The question is am I prepared to pay that price, and the answer is yes.

    I can paint a lot better if I am prepared to spend the time and some posts show this. The problem is I am mostly painting to use the little blighters and I want to get them on the table quickly.

    I can never claim to be able to paint as well as some of you but I can paint better than I often do, but I have chosen to develop a technique that like you M I am happy with.

    From two feet away on the table in the middle of a game I am more concerned about the bloody one I just rolled than what the figures look like.

    You will note that a lot of the Australians I have been painting for most of this year regularly have paint where there shouldn’t be. The close up photos for the blog show this clearly, but I don’t care. They have painted to a standard that I am happy with.

    Sorry for the counter rave but all i can say is hear hear!

    PS I have also learnt from hard experience that there is an inverse relationship with the quality of the figure painting and how well the die roll for them!

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  2. Stick with where you are as far as I’m concerned! 🙂 It’s your hobby to enjoy how you want it! I like your minis as well! I’m in a similar sort of position, only my painting has got worse (arguably) because I’ve gradually moved towards cutting down the time it takes me to paint stuff deliberately. Figures no longer get eyes and I can’t tell the difference with 20mm figures at more than six inches away. I don’t do contrast paints because I’d slap it all over adjacent areas and spend longer touching it all up than I would have otherwise taken, so a base + highlight works fine for me. Loads of people paint better than me and I like their minis but I’ve never been particularly competitive so never get on a downer because I can’t paint that well!

    I’m pretty sure this comment is now as long as your post! Sorry about that!

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  4. My personal opinion (not advice: I learned from my father not to give advice) based on my more than 50 years as a modeller: Improve for the sake of improving, no more, nor less. There are so many people out there who are so talented that if you try to compare yourself to them, your best bet is to quit the hobby for good. One must challenge himself by trying to expand his abilities, but knowing his own limits. So, you’ll be happy creating something a little better than the previous model…sometimes! 😎. Or, as in every instance of our lives, it’s better (and happier) to be oneself. (Out of the soap box, and have a nice modelling day!)

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  5. Do you NEED to improve? Not if you don’t want to. Of course, you’ll still improve incrementally even if you continue doing the exact same thing because you’ll pick up efficiencies in your workflow, so at worst, you’ll get faster at doing the same thing.

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