OK i got my paint. now what?

Check out http://www.angelfire.com/mech/jinsaotom ... gTips.html
and
http://www.angelfire.com/mech/jinsaotom ... Paint.html

Hey thanks so much for all your advice and support its good to finally have a source of info to go to instead of just trying this stuff on my own thanks so much!

also to add to Doc's advice make sure you shake our paints good before use, as paints sit they seperate shake then use.

You're probably using too much paint. Also, don't feel bad about white paint, almost all of the white I've used is terrible to paint smoothly with! That's why if you want to prime a figure then use spray-primer or the brush-on primer. Just using white paint isn't a good idea for primer, the bottle/can has to actually say, "This Is Primer!"

Use a little bit of paint at a time when painting. If you use too much then it's going to dry before you get a chance to smooth it out with the brush, which will leave streaks in the paint. Also, wash your brush often while painting! If paint dries on the brush then it will give you a streaky/bumpy paint-job because stiff bristles are like trying to paint with a comb, it just spreads the paint around but it doesn't smooth it out.

You'll get a feeling for what to do after a while, just experiment and see what works for you.

And to smooth-out your figure, just use some fine sandpaper.

I'm kind of in the same boat.

I bought Model Master's Acrylics. I bought White, Black, Red, Blue, and Yellow. I bought brushes as well of varying sizes. They probably weren't top of the line, but they weren't bargain deal stuff either.

I tried reading through some of the tutorials to get an idea of what to do.

To start off, I'm trying to paint the entire figure white as a primer. Is it suppose to take multiple coats to get it completely white? Also, how do you make it really smooth?

Here is what I'm doing:

dipping brush straight into paint jar
Kind of dabbing paint on figure. When I brush it on its really really streaky and doesn't really seem to paint over anything very well.
I've done this on the whole figure twice now, and its pretty much all white, but its not smooth what so ever.

Can anyone tell me where I might be going wrong?

We have like a million tutorials >_<

http://www.figurerealm.com/customtutorial.php

Specifically, read this one: http://www.figurerealm.com/customtutori ... view&id=21

Scrub your figure with soap and water before painting, and dry it well. You don't have to prime a figure if you wash it first, but primer is good on certain occasions, like Punstarr said.

I'd suggest getting the kind of white primer that you paint on, rather than the spray on kind since the spray can clump real easy if you're not careful.

As far as adding water, I've never had to do that. If anything, I prefer my paint thicker... makes it easier to paint than if it's runny.

so for primer is there any good kind or just any black gray or white spray paint primer? and when I start panting my custom iron man do I drop a drop of water in to the paint to make it easyer to paint on?

I always prime my figures, personally... but it's a personal preference. If you're using yellow or orange or any other light color, you'll want to prime those areas with a light primer.