Jason Just Learned About Painting Miniatures

0:22 Adventures, the podcast for role players and game masters who want to level up your game. We are Dungeon Masters Jason Portiso, I'm Joe McCall and Jim Crocker. Everybody is here. It's awesome. It's just this is just listen. Let's let let's just put the show to the side for a second. This is just nice. Yeah. People are planning things around D and D and then showing up on time and bought me donor I did rewarning. I would bring sorry Jim, but he's hundreds of miles away. Now, mail me one, just like stick it in and envelope. I will, I will one of those priority mail flat rate mailers and just send it on them. Yes, not sticking in a regular envelope. Lick it shut. Yeah, see how that goes? All right, so it seems to be melted.

1:04 Yeah, someone bit our mail? Yeah right, all right, so yeah the ants in my mailbox? Well thank you. That's right, all right. So what I wanted to talk about today was I seem to find there's just endless, endless ways to Depending how you look at it, either immerse yourself in this game further, or you can look at it as making things as complicated as possible, and it's consuming your whole life with this game. Are you talking about LARPing? That's the that would be the next Stele. Okay, that's pretty immersive. I think if I go any more immersive is going to be LARPing, and I want you to punch me if I ever do that. I think the next seven is ren Farris maybe, and then it's LARPing. Okay, is ren fairs LARPing? Renfairs are LARPing.

1:49 I've never been to a ren fairs. Oh you're missing out. Yeah, my wife worked at one for a time. That's awesome. I've been to my share of rend fairs and a right, let's let's let's do let's do it. Like, are you talking about LARPing. I'm not talking about LARPing, And no I'm not trying to I'm not trying to bring this back on track at all, but I'm trying to say this is even further off track. One of my favorite stories that my that my wife tells all the time, and I know I use the term wife and fiance and or to changeably, wife is easier to say these listeners don't know they but I'll but listen I don't think I don't need them thinking it's two different people. Okay, we were at a renfair miles miles from home, at least an hour drive from home, and she was literally just talking about like how everywhere I go, I run into somebody I know everywhere I can't escape it. So we go to find the guys that are doing like the there's a there's a name for the type of like sparring where they're trying to be as like period accurate as possible, and it's like they're actually sparring, they're actually hitting each other.

2:46 So I go over and check those guys out, and and I hear from across the field the guy in full armor goes Portiso, I mean one of the guys fighting, Was it Gordon? Uh No, it is one of the guys from an an old and old game stores hanging out. So listen. So all that to say, I've got my ends if I ever want one. Same, but no, we're actually talking about today is so we did an episode on using and collecting miniatures that was at a six levels of miniatures of miniature. As that was a pretty early episode. You go check that one out. One of my proudest episodes. I think that was I think that was just great content. So since then, and I think I even said in the episode, I'm totally fine with a blank, gray, unprimed miniature sitting on the table. I think it looks great. I think I'm I think I'm on record recorded saying that phrase. Can we insert that audio here? No, because that's more work for me and I'm not going to do that. Just just imagine it. Okay, go back and listen to that real quick. Just listen to me say just now because I just said it. So today's episode is how I just got into painting.

3:47 Yeah. Yeah, painting is for dms that don't already have enough prep. That's fantastic. Like if what you want is more prep yea to you know, if you find yourself of free time, yeah, a lot of free time and unused space in your house, if you just want to fill it up with more crap and cash gold hard well, well we're going to get into that because it doesn't have to be expensive. It does sound very expensive, and that was one of the hurdles that made me take so long, but we're we're going to get into that and how you can do it for I'm never going to call it cheap, but you can keep it like reasonable and with a on budget you don't have to spend games workshop kind of money.

4:27 No, there's other stuff out there we're going to call that would that's what gives that part of the hobby of an expensive reputation. I think, yeah, and is GW because that's what people think of when they're joining mimis. But they have Warhammer forty K, which is already expensive, So what's another one hundred bucks on top of your five thousand dollars army. But the the person that got me into painting is another one of the dms for Dungeons and Drafts. So I'm going to talk to him and see if i can get him to come on the show and talk about his journey in painting, because he is light years ahead of what I've got. So basically, we did an episode at this point, it was only a couple of weeks ago, where we interviewed the founder of Dungeons and draft Thomas Solar. And I've been dming for Dungeons and Drafts for a couple of months now and through the Discord group, all the dms are kind of chumming with each other, and it's a very cool group. If you're a DM, I you should absolutely check them out. And if you're a player, you should check them out and go play. But one of the regular dms was hosting Dungeons and Crafts at one of the breweries and I'm very good friends with and he posted the discord and say, hey, we got some low sign ups on this one and off night. Any dms want to come by, you can come in for free. And I'm like, if it's free, it's for me, and I haven't. I had the night off. I never painted before.

5:35 I never really considered it. Let's go check it out. And I sat in for like a two hour event and it was a little less instruction me than I had pictured in my head and a little more just they hear some paints, everybody go have fun. And I was like, cool, I guess I'll just slap some paint on this thing. And I painted one of the worst miniatures anyone will ever see. And it's not I'm super I'm still proud of it. Okay, if it was two dimensional, I put it on the refrigerator. But the important thing was I was hooked. I had such a good time doing this, and the fact that I was sitting at the table with other dms that also work the same types of events that I do, and we got to kind of commiserate about players that we the types of players that we love to see over and over again, and problem players that we've had problems with, and all kinds of stuff, and it was awesome. And I do that fun thing that everyone else with the ADHD has where I go all in on something immediately. So today's episode is going to be about my so far very short journey to painting and the things that I've been learning so far, and I know that I have infinite left to learn.

6:38 So this is going to be the kind of episode where I'm going to encourage you guys listening to chime in, send us to send us your painting stories, send us places that I'm goofing, send us places that you think I should go next, and other things. In this part, like this is like a subtopic, Like you get to the Greater D and D topic and then the miniatures topic, and then within the miniatre's topic, there's the painting. Yeah. So like down yeah, as you know, Niche is down as much as you need to. We'd love to hear your feedback on this out so me, especially because I'm so like new in this part of it. So that's Hello Adventurers Podcast at gmail dot com, or you can just send us a voicemail Hello Adventurers Podcast dot com slash voice, and I don't have to hear it. So enough babbling, I think we should get into what I've been finding. Yeah. Cool. So the first section I have this set up as section number one. This is the gotta haves, the things that you absolutely must have in order to be able to do this.

7:33 It is physically impossible without some of these things. These are the obvious ones. But for the sake of making a list, let's get these out of the way. So number one rushes and paints. Yep, yeah, obvious because it is you can't finger paint. It is very hard to paint without brushes. It is very very hard to paint without paint. Say what kind of paint is it? So these are usually acrylics? Okay, I don't And again but when we phrase it this way, every paint that I have and everyone that I've seen at the store has been acrylic. Okay, that is not to say that other ones don't exist. So it's not any kind of super specialized pain. It's just acrylic pain. No, these are really just general acrylics. Now, what what's going to set apart of paint made for miniature painting versus like just general cooks that you would buy at any crafton hobby store is the well, the surfing size. First of all, the mature painting is usually in h you know, nature bottle, very small models with the little squeeze because you don't need mutt, right the miniatures, Yeah, just a couple of ounces. Yeah, a dabbile do yeah, as they say, so I find myself the first time I did it, I was like squeezing like a good amount of paint and then I was absolutely wasting my voice paint and and he just kind of laughed it off because it is relative. It can be relatively cheap to get paint, and it's just like, okay, we see every amateur do this, and I'm like, oh no, I'm that guy, like the kid using the ketchup for the first time, exactly for me using ketchup now. So literally like like two drops at a time, it makes a little bit of water into it to fin it out, wow, and and like it does you know, and

9:03 if you and if it drives up, you just put another drop in. Yeah. Whatever. So I've been using less and less paint and to the point where if I have like a spot that only needs like a tiny little bit of one color, I will just kind of like to put right into the bottle. Yeah, whether there's the dropper of the top, so I was kind of speeze to the top and get a little drop. But yeah, they're just general acrylics. They may be different consistency. They might be a little thinner than your average acrylics. I don't know if that's true orfo I'm making that up, but usually want these to be a little on the thin side. That's why you'll you'll you'll thin a mouse in water. You're gonna need a good light source. There's a lot of little like nooks and crannies on these little guys, a lot a lot of places for shadows. So you want a good even light source, soft light source that's from a large area, and something that is daylight white color in the five to six thousand kelvin range. For those of you who know your you know your lights.

9:54 I do know, light is measured in temperature from something like like two thousand in three thousand calvin up to like eight nine thousand, and the cooler the light, which is like more of a blue tint, and then the higher the number of the Fonzi light, yeah, and then the other the warmer the light is it has like just got that, and then a warmer light will have like a yellow or even orange tint to it, where like you're just like like look around your house, your your living spaces, your your living rooms, your dining rooms, your bedroom should be a warmer light. They're gonna be a little on the yellow east side, whereas your workspace is like your laundry room, your your garage is gonna be a little bit a little bit cooler bluish type of light. And if you walk into like a department store, like like like a big box, like like a Walmart type of place to fluorescence are usually a little on the blue side. That's why you kind of get fatigued looking at them so long. It has to keep you keep you awake, is what it is. But that's that's weird.

10:41 Warm is usual a little more inviting, but for stuff like this, we want it to be a daylight white, which is like right smack in the middle, which is about five thousand calvin. A lot of the lights I've been finding have variable temperature, so you can compensate for other lights in your room. I've got pretty warm lights in my office, so sometimes I can compensate for if there's like light spillage. But that's that's going too much unto light. So you want you want a good light source that'll wash into like the little shadowy areas and give you a good accurate color response. Of course you're gonna need miniatures. Lots of places and Pott we did a whole episode on that. So to get started, I got these, I guess starter kits. We'll get into those in a second. But the starter kits that I that I bought came with miniatures. And I have plenty of friends who will resin print, will use resin three D printers to make me stuff.

11:28 Of course I compensate them accordingly. And there's tons of places you can get miniatures that are already made. Go back and find the episode that we talked to about them. You're gonna need a water cup. You probably already have them. It doesn't ruin the cup. You can just use a cup, make sure you wash it thoroughly before you try using it for other purposes later. But most people will kind of have a water cup made and you know, like kind of set aside for designated You use your D and D mug. You bought it a conth like that, and that becomes part of like the ritual of it all. This is supposed to be a relaxing things like this is my water cup. And then do not mix your water cup up with your ice coffee cup. Although for my my artists, my painting friends, my my fine art friends, they have told me that drinking your paint water accidentally is a write of passage. At some point I noticed the other tase. I had my ice coffee with my straw in it, right next to my water cup with my my brush in it. And I was trying not to put my brush in my coffee and not to put my straw on my paint water. And the last thing you needed some sort of palette, just a place to put paint so you can thin them out to the paper plate, so you could do it. Yeah, you do the free version, then replace paper towel. You are gonna need paper towels as well to dry off your not only to dry off the rushes after you washing them, but also to kind of like a wick off the excess those are You absolutely gotta have paint brushes, a light source, miniatures, a water cup, and some sort of pallette. You get these things and you can get started. All of these things, except for the light source and the water

13:00 cup are going to come in a lot of these starter kits. I actually got three different starter kits just to make sure my basis recovered. Yeah, one I to befad. Two of them were like a like a Step one and the Step two type of things. So I got the system through there that was from that was from Weeper Minis. I have two separate starter kits, and then I got the one from Army Painter. I just saw that on I just took a quick look on Amazon and those first one that popped up and I got that because that's the brand. My friendly local Game store happens to Parry, so I went over and supported them, and that's the one I've been working on now. It just showed you some of the minis that I that I've been working on. There If you look at my dming instagram which is at Jason the DM. I got pictures of all these up there, so you can check that out. And these and these kids come with all the starter stuff. There's paints and these brushes in there, but there's miniatures in there, so that'll get you started. That's what you absolutely need. How many brushes do you want to start with? Do you are there different to start with? You're fine with just the one. Most of these kits are going to come with what is called a number one brush, which is just a general like you know, not too big, not too small. You can get details, you can get broadstrokes. The starter kits are going to come with the brushes that you need, and then as you kind of gain preferences and learn you know where the shortcomings are. Where there they where the strengths and weaknesses of different types of brushes are, that's when you can start expanding your collection, expand out. Sure, Yeah, I did get myself a set of miniatures brushes. There's like like ten or twelve brushes in there, all different, all different sizes. I'm just going to call them gages because that's all I really know how to call them. I don't really know that if there's like a word for brush gages zero exactly,

14:31 yeah, one and two and stuff like that. One of these that I painted, I actually had to go reach for the five zeros, the smallest one. I d Yeah, it's a she is wearing a what I what I interpret to be like a ribbon necklace. Yeah, and I needed that ribbon to be like fine, fine, fine, Yeah, I think, but I think there might be some people a little nervous about like do I need a whole set of brushes for doing different stuff? And yeah, when you get started, that'll be that's the expansion stuff. Yeah, to you know, even just the one, you can do most of what you need to. Yeah, and that, you know, it seems like too like it really depends on how much fine detail you really want to sure pain or get into so well, and you know, in fairly short order you'll have, you know, one of your brushes that you've kind of worn down and you turned that into your dry brush and stuff like that. This's all but this is probably this I maybe getting ahead of less. Yeah, we'll cover all that in a second. Those are those are the absolute got of halves.

15:26 So let's get into the nice to haves. Hello Adventurers, just stepping in here to remind you guys that we're actively looking for submissions for our Hello DMS episode that gets reported every month. Send us your burning D and D questions to Helloadventurers podcast at gmail dot com, or send us a voicemail by visiting Hello Adventurers podcast dot com slash voice. Don't forget to begin your message with Hello DMS. You can't wait to get your questions and talk about them on the show. Send us your questions today. That's Hello Adventurers Podcast at gmail dot com. Poorly the voice going at Toloadventurers podcast dot com slash voice. Now let's get back to the show. This small list here is things that I would recommend maybe getting all in the in the first batch, but you don't need it if you're I know, if this is a gift, Maybe this is maybe these are some of the parts that lay the person you're giving you too might be might get themselves, or you may have a more preference on some of these and you don't just want to grab like the starter.

16:30 So I call these the nice to have. You can absolutely get away without them, or you can di why these which is another reason that happened separate. So number one of my nice to have is a handle. So this is like a grip that another mader was I'm going to made a plastic and they give you just a more ergonomic way of holding something so small, oh okay, okay, and so you'll be like it'll be like a wooden like pommel that fits in the hand nicely, and then the miniature will sit on top of it. The one that I have, the miniature will sit on a stand with like like like that blue like sticky tack stuff that your kindergarten teacher used to put on the wall with, So that sticks the miniature to the to the base, and then the base sits on the handle with a magnet and this way you can rotate it three sixty. Oh that's interesting.

17:15 And then mine has a small handle on the side that you can rest your hand on and steady the whole thing. And the other ones will have like different ergonomic like grips, and so this is something that sits in front of you, and he sits in your hand. Okay, yeah, it's small, it's it's it's gripped like I think, like almost like a well size wise, think of like like like a bicyle handle. Okay, so it's like that fits in your hand and it's just a little a little more just ergonomic for holding it for a long time, and you can get you can hold in different positions. Some of them will have like more around their bases. You can hold them upside down or grip them differently. And I mean, I guess the other thing means to be said is this isn't anything that I'll like, you know, a parent need on moltipliers you've got sitting in your toolbox is not going to accomplish as well. Well, this is one of the things that is the easiest and maybe first maybe for a starter, it may be even best to DIY. So when I sat in on that dungeon and craft session, he just gave us all bottle caps like off of like like like like twist off caps, like like off a two letter of bottle. And that was enough to just like sit in like you know, two or three fingers just so I'm not touching the base in the mini.

18:18 Yeah, and then not to kind of twist it in the position. It's not the most ergonomic thing in the world, but it was free, right, and if you're having a public event, that's perfect. I've also seen people using quirks, like like I have a wine bottle, and that's a little bit longer, a little more ergonomic, and it's a little softer, so it's no nicer to grip. For so far, these miniatures that I've been painting have taken me about two hours, so that's that's a while to grip something. And I will say the first one that I did, I did without a handle. I didn't have anything in the house. I didn't well, I have bottle casts, but I did not have any like sticky tack. I had no way of really attaching it. So I just held it the whole time And do not recommend it. Can you can, but I don't recommend it. It was it was a lot. Yeah, you know, you don't want to give yourself carpal tunnel for no reason.

19:03 Right, that's a handle, And then I have small tools. So even if you're getting the miniatures straight out of the box Preff manufacturer, they might they might be like some burrs in the in the plastic, especially if they're like if you're if you're friends three D printed them, or if you three D printed them. You know, bits from the supports could still be on there, and a lot of the ones that I've been getting from Army Painter are like snapped together, so they came in on like is she kind of like a board game when you pop out all the pieces the first time, So there's little burs from the plastic. So your basic toolkit is going to be like like flat and sidecutters and an exact o knife and like tweezers. So these are just going to kind of like as you file. Would you use a file on that at all? I think the exact dough is just going to do the job job just as well. And if you, I mean, if you really want to send stuff down drumm then I mean you can get drummle if you want to spend money, but just to like an emory board that you'd use it, Yeah, okay, it's perfectly good for you. I think that's what I meant said. File nail file like a nail file. Yeah yeah, yeah, It's not part of my kit, but yeah, absolutely anything to just get like those little birds all down.

20:07 Those are the things are gonna do you want to fix up the most. So in my personal kit. I got some cheap tweezers. I got the cheapest exact on knife I could find. I got the cheapest sidecutters, and I will say with the sidecutters, make sure you get the flat side ones because you want to get right up next to the piece and I clip those off. And that's another one where a lot of those companies, your Army Painter and your Reaper and stuff like that, will sell a kit that has all that included in there. For thank you, thank you for bringing that up, jim My recommendation. Yes, those companies will package them with their brand on it. Absolutely don't buy them. The sidecutters that I bought look Iantic Golf, everything down to the red handle through the sidecutters that I bought from the just from home depot and not even like not even like a mom and pop shop, just like home depot or Afraid or something. Joe, guess how much they work from home depot? Three dollars four but yeah, okay, And I guess how much Army Paintern wanted for the same exact thing.

21:04 Nine twenty bucks? What, yeah, twenty dollars five hundred percent markup? Yeah, complete insanity. They had the exact O knives too, for like triple the price. Then then you can get from Staples when I go for like ten bucks eight eight for a basic one. Yeah, for twelve you can get one of the nice ergonomic handle and they're Tweezers set a set of three tweezers they wanted ten dollars for and I got the same exact thing on Amazon for two. Wow. It's it's just unreal. There's the markup on those. So yeah, these paints are these paints are places are fine, and your friendly local game store will carry them, and they'll be there because you're already gonna be in a friendly local game store. And if you're in a pinch, go ahead. Convenience. Not my money. I'm not going to tell you how to spend it, but christ guys come on like like just army painter, get it together. Twenty bucks for for for side cutters is stupid. Yeah. Yeah, if it was at least a little closer, like I'd prefer to give it to a it's it's such a great somebody other than am such a grift. I don't love giving giving Amazon money, but they bring it to my house. So and that's the energy I have, so I like, I don't. It's it's not a grift.

22:12 It's it's what it costs to get it through that system and put it on the games on the game store shop, right, someone who used to own a game store, like, it's not a grift, it's it's that Home Depot is vertically integrated and own's their entire supply chain. So it's absolutely it's going to be much much cheaper. Yeah, and they have not because it's engaged in criminal activity. There's not a gift grist from the game stores. It's a grift from army, from army painter where he's saying, the stuff you buy directly from army, and I mean there there overhead is going to be a lot different than than Home Depot and Amazon too. However, I don't think it's it's that to that so so worse than a grift. It's capitalism, all right. So that's that's your small tools. I also haven't here a magnifier. These minis are by very definition miniature. They're tiny.

23:10 There's some little spots in there that like just just getting the brush in there just so it's a little tough. The minute that you told me about painting miniature is the first first thing I Yeah. The first thing I thought of, though, was that scene from forty year Old Virgin Shorties, like you had silver pants and now they're blue or something like that. He's painting the little miniature with the giant magnifier in his apartment. So the light that I got has magnifier in it. It's a ring light with a with a tight, nice magnifier in it. And if I don't even magnifier, I just don't look through it. And in alterly, uh in uh thirty years, you'll be able to read newspapers with that. Yeah, sure, try Like three, I did find out that a reader reading glasses are an inevitability, and that's just kind of how I aging works. So if you have readers, don't feel bad about it. Everyone will eventually. Can Lasik fix that something? Damn it? Lasik starts losing its effectiveness after age thirty five.

24:08 Oh, son of a gun. I missed the boat on that one. The cataracts also an inevitability. And one of our sponsors is every time I listen to our podcast, it's las okay lasic dot com and and side note, one of the podcasts that I that I edit professionally is run by an entomologist. So I'll so I've got all eyeball facts ready to go. This show is fantastic A lousy with eyeball tame. The last thing I have on the nice to have is a wet palate. Now this is actually like a real piece of gear that you probably should be getting. This is this is probably some people put this in the got to have list, but you can absolutely get by and do fine with a normal palate as opposed to a wet palate. What you've got that look different between a wet palate and a not wet palate. Sure, wet palate is is exactly how what's implied. It is wet. It uses. You can use something as simple as a paper towel, but there are like this for it that is designed for it.

25:02 But it sits on top of water and keeps the paint wet so that the paint won't try out. This is also great for color mixing and for thinning your paint. I will say that my understanding of wet palletts is not quite there yet. I don't have one. I don't use one for Bob Ross using a wet palette. I don't remember. I don't remember him painting a tiny little uh orchie either, So we're gonna put a happy little orc over here. It's not a sentence. So for the sake of this episode, I'm not going to comment too much on wet pallets because my understanding of them is so little. But do you know they are different, and I know that they are very like they're like pretty ubiquitous across most people's kits. Tell me about your wet paltte Hello Adventures podcast dot com slash slash voice. That's that's the that's probably my next step of my purchases. My wife would have more information on or any of the resources that I'll give it the end of the episode. But yeah, wet palate, I'm gonna puts the nice to have this next session. Were going to call kind of once things that just make the whole experience just a little bit nicer and kind of like puts you in a little bit more of a headspace of like this is a thing that I'm planning to do now and not just like a little like oh, miniature studio kind of yeah you no, no, I mean that's that's the next Yeah, like I kind of want like a little like a like a like a shed. Sure there is a lot to say, but having a dedicated and that's for any hobby or or anything like Like when when we moved into the place that we that we live in now, one of my absolute non negotiable prerequisits was an extra bedroom that I so I can have an office.

26:34 You gotta have. That was my gotta have because I do work from home a lot, and I need a dedicated space so it feels like I'm working or else I just never get anything done. And it's been a godsend. I do a ton in there. So now like one corner of my office, I have an extra like fold up desk that I had already that was using for other things and that's now my miniature station. So having a dedicated space is like just kind of like when you're in that space, this is the thing you're gonna do. And whether it's you know, if you're you know, if you're in school, you've got you've got your dedicated to like homework space. If you're working, if a specially press work from home from home, a home office is just awesome. You already have spaces like this. You probably don't even know it, or we probably probably don't even recognize it as being that thing. You have a dining room, it's in the name. This is where you have dinner. Yeah, you got you got dedicated spaces. Although I did just see an article that if you're a millennial, you may not have a dining room. That's dining room. That's I heard millennials are killing in the dining room. That's the newest thing that we've killed. Three are supposed to record your podcast. That's where we're live from the dining room. This is more my this is the board game and DVD room than it is my dining room. I think I've got like three meals here. Ever, all my meals here have been at the stable playing Dungeons and Dragons or podcasts. Yes, we made so I'm going to added to the kind of wants list where you want some sort of dedicated space and maybe a dedicated desk. I think that's fair to put that in the in the in the kind of wants section. Yeah, that worked ou pretty well.

27:56 What I have on here already is a heat dryer. This is like you can get these for like under twenty bucks. I think I paid twelve bucks for mine, like a heat gun. A heat gun. Okay, if you do any kind of like soldering type of work, you probably already have one of these. I already owned one because I had it in my soldering kit. This is how you shrink shrink tubing. Some people might have it for like restoration type of work, so you can like soften up glue so you can peel things off. We got ours so that we could do the plastic on the windows for the winter. So we're in the northeast here. Yes, anything any quarterly shrink tubing or heat activated adhesives something I already have. You might already have one. Yeah, and if you don't. The one that I got myself, it was twelve bucks. It was cheap.

28:37 So why heat guns? So paint doesn't dry instantly and watching it dry is famously boring, as I've been told. But I was just going to use like my little fan that I have on my desk for when it gets hot and moving air across paint will dry it a little bit faster, but the heat will dry even fast. Yeah, I was gonna say too. And it's more these you can't just use your hair dryer. It doesn't. It's not enough. It doesn't get hot enough usually, but also it's not as directed. So because we tried to use our hair dryer for that again, for that plastic sheeting short around the windows, it didn't do the job well enough. Yeah, that doesn't work. Yeah, it doesn't really where they say to use it. It doesn't work well enough. So that's where the heat gun. So just yeah, now, from a lot of the DIY articles that I've read on painting your hair drying, it might be enough for miniature so it'll take longer tho, yeah, of course longer. But this this dedicated heat gun, I'll just like, no, I'll give things like a wash coat, hit it with a heat gun, and then by the time I go refill my re film my coffee, then it's all good.

29:41 And the other thing I have on here just to kind of keep yourself not only keeping yourself from getting paint everywhere, but also this kind of gets for me. This is another step in that getting in the headspace of this is what I'm about to do. I need to get other distractions out of my head. And maybe this is a psychological thing for me, but I put an apron on here Okay, a cool like canvas or denim apron. All all your all your barber friends have one, all your tattooer friends have one. I'm thinking, I'm thinking worse smock and you could just go like you did in preschool or kindergarten. Your dad, your dad, Yeah, I'm backgroud. Yeah. The problem is my dad was a smaller size to me. Now, So Dad, can I absolutely destroy one of your shirts?

30:25 Go to good Will? Go to good Will get a get ax Yeah, you know, depending on your size, or like two or three sizes larger button up shirt for a dollar. Yeah. I think between you, me and Jim, we can just each hand a shirt to the left and then everyone's fine. But I got myself a canvas apron. Not only does this function as a smock and keep all my shirts nice without me having to change clothes and to get into the headspace, but there's also pockets and stuff. So if I want to keep my exact dough with the sheath on in a convenient spot, I don't have to reach across the desk and stuff like that. And you cool, I'm sure in it. My wife has told me, yes, I do. She says I'm a handsome boy. Even just like having my phone and like you know, out of the way. I'll keep an iPad on the desk because right now I'm watching tutorials as I do it, so I'll have something to watch, but also playing music and stuff.

31:14 So if you'se some music on your phone, look like a Michelin start chef with your tweezers like sticking out of it real cool. No, I look like a modern chef like covenant tattoos and completely cracked out. Yeah, star chef. I feel like we're saying the same it's getting you redundant. So so in the kind of ones this is like if you if you really just want to just get the next step, So that is a heat dryer, an apron or a smock, and some sort of dedicated spase. Uh my fourth section here, we're going this down the line. This is as you these are things that I would not fully recommend in your first batch of purchases. I would I would work with these things for at least like three to six months before moving on to these things and list and this is probably where you're going to start getting into investing. Is a good deal? Yeah, And not only do you not want to get these immediately for the investment reasons because like, you don't need to spend this much money up front, but also like in my case, at least, you want to have a couple of months under your belts that you can develop preferences. And this is something that I've always done with like my guitar students. I was a guitar teacher for nineteen years, and I always recommended my students get the cheapest guitar that won't fall apart, and then you know, instead of spending one thousand dollars now, spend two hundred now and then get a good one hundred dollars guitar later. Once you know what you do and don't like, because you don't want a thousand dollars guitar that you don't like. I have several, but that's because I'm impulsive. But these are things that like you want to know, like why are you buying this thing? What problems is it solving?

32:47 And maybe borrow someone else's in certain cases and see like you know, what is it about this particular one? Like what am I looking for when I do purchase one of these things? So for example, so let's just go down the list. My number one down the line is an airbrush. And the reason I put this later is because it is a whole technique in and of itself. Yeah, and not one that I am ready to start learning, because I'm still learning basic techniques, I mean, and not everybody has a space where they could do it. It's actually pretty I mean, like you got to make sure it's vented and all this kind of stuff. Yeah, it's a whole thing. It's it's like borderline a different hobby almost. Yeah, and the you know than the painting with the brushes. Yeah, Now, air rushing for miniatures it is easier to do it fully indoors and as opposed to like resin three D printing that wet thought down the past episodes, the ventilation that you need is not nearly as complicated. It can be as simple as a fan. But they make boxes for these with like air purifiers in them, so like you can do it without without you know, doing your whole house. But you can't just you don't want to just spray it into a shoe box either, No, right, not getting so, So that's why I'm putting it down the linecause it's a whole different set of things to buy also completely different techniques to learn your brush stuff first, and like you know, if you have friends with air brushes, maybe you try out one of theirs. They've tried different ones and see like how they you know, if someone has a thirty dollars one and someone has three hundred dollars one, Now, how does the action feel? Is it really worth the ten times price? Yeah, there's little hobby air brushes I know you can get at like Michael's that. Yeah, I think I had one at

34:20 one point. But this is where you that's where you want to have a gearhead friend. You want to have somebody that works on cars. Yeah, yeah, yeah, they'll they'll have access to that and probably you know, if any you know, anybody that does any kind of like detailing on choppers or anything like that. That's so those are the guys to talk to. But to your point, Jim, it really is. It's a totally different Maybe it was you that made the point. Totally different technique. So I'm not friends with an intuitive, I'm not friends with any car guys. But you know who I know who does own hair brushes. People are into nails, oh sure, nail or air brushes and your barbers, depending what kind of like stuff they do. There's there's air brushing with with like very particular fade type of cuts. I did not know that. Yeah, those are the people I know with it with airbrushes and hobbyists. Of course, next is gonna be storage. You're gonna be You're gonna add a lot of mini to your collection, and you're gonna want to put them into You're gonna want toss them in a bin less than you did when they were unpainted, because now you got stuff to scratch and ruin. There's all kinds of storage options.

35:14 You know your use case better than I do. There's all kinds of portable ones that are like like picking pluck foam, so you can bring them to games more easily if people come to your house to play. There's more like they kind of look like mini fridges with like trays in them. That seems to be the most popular ones. And then some of them just look awesome and you want shelves and so there's so there's all kinds of options for that, but you're gonna want to think of some sort of storage once they start getting to be too much for your desk. Right now, they live on my desk where I paint them. Now that we talked earlier about about getting higher end brushes, this is when you could get early on, so at least you learn the difference between how an expensive brush feels versus a cheap one. But like I said, the kits came with a cheap brush.

35:55 I bought myself a set of decent brushes, and then I bought myself one single high end brush. A lot of the wikis and the articles that I was looking at suggested even just having even just one of a size one high end sable brush, So that's what I did. I got that and I have not used it yet, but I even getting one early on will kind of show you how a high end brush will retain, paint, will spread, and you know all the qualities of a brush. And even holding on to just the one number one sable and just having that in your arsenal for like for detailed type of stuff is something you want to want to look into.

36:37 A lot of them are not recommending necessarily getting a whole set of high end stale table brushes. There's no reason to spend one hundred dollars on brushes where like it because this one brush was ten bucks. Yeah, and like you know, ten bucks to drop in the bucket compared to everything else. But that adds up when you have like fifteen brushes in your personal Yeah, so I don't mind spending ten bucks on one brush and then my entire other set. I think it was twenty for the whole set. Okay, it's just that bad. So so those, I think are the places where you can really grow. That's your your airbrush, your storage options, your sable brushes. Oh and if you want to get into making the the miniatures yourself is of course getting into resin three D print thing, which we talked about on the Miniature Collecting episode. Not much new to be said about that, just to just be aware of how much space and ventilation that they need.

37:23 And yeah, they stink, they do, like resin smells yep. And it doesn't just smell, it's toxic. Yeah, yeah, you can't. You can't breathe that all day or at all. So I do have friends that live in apartments and they build themselves things to make it work in the closet, and it was working for them, and so there there are options. So like, just just be safe, be careful and know what you're getting into. But if this is like a huge thing for you, where there's a will that is a way you can find something. It may end up taking up space in your house that your partner may want, may not want it to be taking up space, and it may increase your your investment too. To your point, you have to make something special, yea, and I just get like hook up with someone who's like a knitter or something like that, and then you you should be able to claim you have at least as much space for your monies as they have for their yard. And then and you guys will get along great fantastic. Now, if you can't find a I can't find space or just really just don't want to it, just kind of work on that with with printing it yourself. You know, we'll get to this in the next section. But find me someone who can print for you and just I know it's awesome. A few bucks to use the printer in their downtime has been working for me. So your mileage may vary, but that'll be part of our next section, which we'll get to now. My last section here this is doesn't really go into like things to buy or things to get or study or anything. And this is I'm calling this community. This is absolutely a hobby that you can do totally by yourself and probably be fully fulfilled. And I think I'm you know, I'm sure

38:55 there's plenty of people out there who paint on their own for their own uses and little ambient music on and just yeah, the way we do absolutely do you know one of them doesn't know the ambient music you can throw on death metal if you want whatever, whatever relaxes insane class maybe shout out, rot out. But I was watching episodes of What Did I Have On the other day. I was, you say, I gotta like game drums in the background or something. The other day I like, stop and laugh my ass off for a few minutes. But but this is something that, like most hobbies, is enjoyed better in groups. And it's because this is also a skill. I think a community and some sort of group that can like bounce their ideas and bounce their knowledge off each other is just makes it that much more fulfilling. So these are just general places to find communities for kind of anything. This isn't really like a specific two miniatures type of thing. But your Facebook groups, your your subreddits, your discord groups, all those are gonna be great online places. I mean, there's there's a reddit for everything, but man, even more so, there's a face. There's probably a handful of Facebook groups for everything, absolutely every absolutely, and they're great knowledge bases as somebody that's you know, into a lot of different hobbies. Yeah, I can't recommend Facebook groups and look up look up ones that are local to you too. So like nowhere based in New Jersey, there's a New Jersey D and D players Facebook group. That's how I found Jim. That's how I found my local game store, That's how I got into a lot

40:30 of my dming stuff. So the Facebook groups were a great place to find community for that. The r slash I think it's mini's painting, may be mini painting, miniature painting, I forget exactly what it's called. But there's a great subreddit that seems pretty pretty non toxic actually, despite the paints being very toxic. Don't don't drink the paint, but definitely go check out those comments. They seem to be pretty supportive of each other so far. And then there's there's there's gonna be discord groups just a general D and D group. A lot of them will have a separate area for miniature show Off and that kind of thing. I mentioned London Draft, so there's one for the dms. Mostly it's a coordinate what games we're going to take over. But we've been talking about our paints a lot on there, and we were starking a little bit about Games Workshop and how much it costs before. But that is a hobby where painting is a big part of that hobby and so if you look for, you know, stores that sell GW if they're having paint days and things like that, you know, we're times when you can get together and paint. They're happy to have you come in and bring your D and D minis as well. So that's another place to kind of look for that community of people that are that are painting, and not just that are painting, but that are painting a lot. Yes, you know, where it's a big part of that. And you know, for the most part, my experience with that was that, like everybody was always happy to have new people come in and show them, you know, tricks and tips and stuff like that. So another place to look for that is is those you know miniature gaming community. That was actually my next point was the i r L. The i r L places to make communities. And not only well, you're funding local game stores. Your your local store probably sells paints and we probably love people to come in and talk about paints and buy them from them. And if a lot of games whos will even have like paint classes

42:02 or even just like a like a get together paint like it's like a sip and paint type of thing. And if your game store doesn't have one, talk to them about starting one. For some game stores, just having the extra foot traffic inside would be enough for them to say yes. Others might want to charge like a like a door fee, like a like a table fee, which we paid at the door, and that's that's fine too. These places are paying their rent based on their square footage, and it's you know, they usually it's just going to be to cover your material costs that man sometimes sometimes, but also like you know, they're paying for their square footage and they have to maximize the profitability of that square footage. So if they ask for just a space fee, you know, don't don't get many grief for that. But you know, if they're including like paints or a miniature or anything like that. Someone includes snacks if they If they can't include stuff like paints, then then that's cool too. But if your store doesn't have a paint night, talk about starting one. We just just started one at our local store. Cool and they do it on a night that I can't go. I've not been to one yet, but the the person running it has played in some of my store games there. He's awesome. He's one of the ones who's in printing meanings for me and just just all too happy to do it and talk about it. It's just like people who are into it. When they find new people who are into it, they love to talk about it. So you love you love to see it. And of course, so that's your feminical game store and the last one in I L group, your playgroup. If you're playing a game, just you know, see if anybody else wants to join you. And because you know I'm going to it our next game. Jeff, Yeah, man, I would love to host you know, paint parties just here. I think we should

43:34 do a sip and paint here, you know, so come over a couple hours early, will a little paint miniatures dedicated night. Yeah tonight, that's fine too. We're gonna we're gonna sip and paint. We're gonna chug, chug and paint. Yeah yeah, that slam. A couple of sixteens are But that's that's been generally in my findings on my couple of weeks as a new miniatures paint. Thanks for bringing that to it. So I'm gonna recap all of that. So that is your Section one is your gotta has. These are your absolute must. That's paints, brushes, a good light source, a water cup, some sort of palette, and of course miniatures. Section two is nice to have. This is a handle, a small tool set, a magnifier and a wet palate. Section three is your kind of once that is an apron, a heat dryer, and some sort of dedicated space. Four is down the line. That's your airbrush, your storage options, a sable brush or a sable brush set, and a three D resume printer or a friend who can three D resume print for you. And then your community. Online communities include Facebook groups, Reddit and discords and your IRL groups are your already existing play group and your friendly local game store or possibly your podcast co hosts, and that's it. And this has been like, this has been taken up like a good amount of my time recently, and I this is time that I would have absolutely wasted. I've mentioned several times on the show. I'm an audio engineer for a living. I do concert work. So my normal bedtime for myself is like three am. That's just when I get home. That's just when I when I get tired, and

45:06 I'll kill those last like two hours like on the couch watching TV or on my phone watching YouTube, or just doom scrolling or just endless Reddit, endless Reddit, end listening Instagram. I put a parental control on my own phone to make me stop scrolling through Instagram, Reddit and all those after. I'm even embarrassed to say how much time I gave myself and I run out every day, and so having just even two hours set aside to not do that, and they actually have something to show for it. I got the miniatures on the table in front of me right here. They're really great. There, they're really it looks like I've been painting for as long as I've been painting, and comparatively, I mean, it's just I'll go look at my DM instagram that is at Jason the d M, and I will put a picture of the the one that I painted at the at the Dungeons and Craft event versus the one that I just did like two nights ago. Yeah, so pretty, it's pretty clear. Great. One of the great things about this as a hobby is that you get better at it very quickly when you first start doing it. Yep, and like there there's a whole lot of One of the things you'll learn, especially if you start to talk to some people who have been doing it for a while, is there some shortcuts and tricks that just once you learn them, your stuff, you know, it kind of just levels up very quickly. Yeah. And you know the one you did, the very first one you did, compared to the one you do just like ninety days later, the difference is huge. And that's one of the super fun things about it. Well, this is about twenty you get better at it's already a lot, yeah, mostly interesting, and it's

46:37 just it's just fun and like and it's just it just feels good to like walk away with something that I helped create and like this and this is a one of a kind I made this, and it's it's a very satisfying hobby. A lot of my other hobbies include things that don't continue to exist when they're done, board gaming and the D and D game we have. You have stories to tell them. That's about it. And you know, and even as a musician, very few times do your record. You know, for the amount of times that I play Initiative versus the the handful of songs I have recorded, there's not a lot to take away with a lot of the hobbies I have. And this is cool because every time I do it, I'm gonna have something to take away. So yeah, this is this is my current ADHD fixation and you know, money dump and things to do that. But if this is your first time hearing about how to get started in miniatures and now you're peaked, I would love to go with you on your journey. I would love to hear how you how you plan on starting, and I would love to see your your first paint. So you can send us your comments and everything to Hello Adventurers Podcasts at gmail dot com, or you can just tell us how excited you are, or tell us how long you've been painting, or tell us your favorite painting story. That's Helloadventurers podcast dot Com slash Voice and I do want to get Mike on here, who's the one who got me into it. Some of his painting stuff that he sent pictures of are I'll show you. I'll show you, guys.

47:57 These off off Mike. Unbelievable. The the the floor is like easy to get to and the ceiling doesn't exist. It's completely nuts with some of the people have pulled off. So super excited to continue with this. Anything anything to add boys, No thanks for sharing that with us. Cool. Decided to try myself. Did I miss anything huge that like a game store owner would would have recognized that I missed, You know what, maybe maybe one thing sure, and that is that one of the things that you can get into that can be fun, which is like a little kind of a next level kind of thing, is modifying some of your minis. You know, like like like you you clip a sword off of somebody and you you know, take the axe off someone else and you switch them around or something like that. That's a thing that you can kind of get into with you, you know, with your your super glue and your advance and your clippers, and that can be a lot of fun doing that kind of that kind of kip bashing, you get a little better at it. One of the minis manufacturers now comes with like module pieces. There's different hands and different weapons and different facial expressions and like, yeah, they're a little bit more expensive, but like you can paint them all and swaps. Yeah, and that is a thing that the GW guys. You you get folks that are playing GW there way into all that kind of modification and stuff like that, and they'll have a lot of good advice tricks and tips and and you know, and what they call bits bins right from all the like just you know, extra

49:28 weapons and stuff that that come on a sprew for a you know, spru Fall, Space Marines or you know, Fantasy ORCS or something like that. So that that can be another kind of fun direction to go in the g W also for creative do they also do the Star Wars mini's games that then I don't think so now, okay, Fantasy, Okay, okay, one of the other main major these guys, All right, cool, thanks for face for capping that off, Jim Joe, We're good. Yeah, cool, Want to come point paint with me? Yeah, let's do it right now. Guys, thank you so much for listening to Hello Adventurers. We are your host Jason Portizo, Jim Crocker and Joe McCall producer, editoring engineer Jason Portiso. Music by Nick Sperior, artwork by Kristen Broderick. You can reach out to us with any feedback or questions by emailing Hello Adventurers podcast at gmail dot com. Hello Adventurers is a GTP audio production. Goodbye,