Too much flow-improving and your washes go where you don’t want it.įor a starting point toward making your own washes that is nearly identical and much cheaper than Citadel’s version is to start with approximately 8 parts mixing medium (any brand, or use list below), 3-4 parts highly-pigmented ink (of any preferred color), and 2 parts flow aid/improver. The reason I don’t use flow-improver most of the time is that you actually lose control of your wash.

I love Liquitex Airbrush Medium for this purpose because it is easy to use and inexpensive. A flow-improver might be simple dish detergent, or other soapy household product. The wash will slide across raised surfaces into recesses more easily. But, a flow-improver, also known as a “surfactant” breaks the surface tension of water.

Flow-improver – In general, I find this component optional.

Essentially, making your own paint from scratch. Or, you can use other fancy things, like dry pigments that you dissolve in your thinner. You can use acrylic paints or inks (which have a higher pigment density and lower viscosity, e.g., “watery”).

Color pigment – This can be anything you want.

If you’re making oil washes (see here for example), then you’ll need a different solvent such as mineral spirits.

Thinner – The best thinner for water-based acrylic paint or ink is water (almost all well-established model paints or inks use water-based acrylic mediums, e.g., Games Workshop, Vallejo, Army Painter, P3, Scale 75, Reaper Paints).

Most of the time, it only takes three ingredients to make a wash: The same colors you use to paint miniatures make great washes if you know how to thin them down properly. You can make washes with thinned acrylic paint. Or, you can buy ready-to-use washes for painting miniatures. You can use different mediums to make a wash (see example acrylic ink washes here or oil washes here). RELATED: USE WASHES TO GLAZE METALLIC PAINTS When it comes to painting miniatures, contrast is king. The best kind of washes help you maintain high-contrast on a model. Washes are especially useful in speed painting. I almost always use a wash in my miniature painting. Washes essentially darken a model, but do so where it gathers most, in recesses. In other words, after you apply a wash over a surface, the color should flow easily off raised areas into deeper areas, e.g., cracks or concave corners.Ī “wash” may also be termed as a “shade”. When applied liberally over an entire model, a wash will flow off the high points and concentrate in the recesses. Washing miniatures is a technique that uses a thin, low viscosity pigmented color that flows into deeper crevices, troughs, and cracks of a figure. In the world of miniature painting, a wash is an artistic medium that you use to move pigment into recessed areas of a model. Read on for more details about washes, and the review of the top 7 washes for painting miniatures and models. You can check out my gallery for some examples of how I’ve used these washes to paint miniatures. Of course, I use many washes, but the washes on this list are the most frequently used as you will see why below.

Quickshade washes examples