A guide to painting your 3D Gizmo figure

By Lucian Andrews

3D Gizmo figures are my favourite choice of figure. Having painted many figures from various sources, I have found the figures from 3D Gizmo to be consistently high quality and are the best for achieving a decent end product: these figures are always a pleasure to paint. Painting should be an enjoyable practice and with 3D Gizmo, the figure almost ‘paints itself’; you can exploit the detailing in the print to support your painting and by using a few techniques in this guide you’ll see how these figures will help you to get the best end result.

Each figure is blemish free and the detailing is superb. In fact, the details are fine enough to rival the most expensive resin figures produced.

Preparation before painting is minor – due to the meticulous process that 3D Gizmo use to clean their figures before you receive them, the surface of the figure is clean and the texture of the figure seems to lend itself well for the painting process. This is likely due to the type of resin used by 3D Gizmo but it very much feels like the Vallejo paints are designed for this type of surface.

In this support guide, you will be given a few hints, tips and suggestions to help you to find your own method of figure painting. Everyone has their own way of painting and sometimes what works for one painter, doesn’t work for all. No matter what techniques you use, you’ll find painting these particular figures a rewarding and enjoyable experience.

Here is the figure that will be painted:

Prime your figure first.

Tools:

fine brush (0/20 is recommended)
small make-up brush
small, stiff brush (size 0)
pin

Paint:
Vallejo’s model colour works very well with the 3D Gizmo figures. As only a small amount of paint is needed, these colours will last plenty of time.

Colours:

70.804 Beige Red
70.815 Basic Skin Tone
70.928 Light Flesh
70.814 Burnt Red
70.859 Black Red
Black

Optional:

70.377 Gold Brown
70.947 Dark Vermillion

The two colours mentioned above are optional as only a small amount of the paint is used – they enhance the figure but are not integral to achieving a good finish.

Here are the figures to be painted. The high level of detailing will provide a solid foundation for my painting today. Each face seems to have its own personality.

Step 1:

Using the beige red, apply a base coat. On this coat, any wet brush will work. I don’t water the paint down too much on this particular coat. Water will be your friend later in the painting process but right now, the consistency doesn’t matter too much.

Step 2:

This part of the process will set up the eyelashes. Using any dark brown or the black-red mixed with a pin-dot of black, fill in the eyes. Paint slightly more than the eyeball if you can. Keeping it neat will avoid any need to clean up but if you do go too big, wait for it to dry for a minute and then cut around using the base colour.

Step 3:

Here’s where you need to trust the detail in the figure! You’ll need to mix water with a drop of burnt red. It looks bloody! In fact, the texture is that of blood. Let it run into all the creases of the face. Here’s what I mean by ‘let the figure paint itself.’ He looks a mess, doesn’t he? But trust the process. Lay the figure down (rather than standing him up) so that the paint can dry in the crevices and creases. Leave it to dry for a while – and it does need to be completely dry for the next step to work effectively.

Step 4:

This is my favourite step as the features of the figure ‘pop’ and is the reason why 3D Gizmo figures paint up so well. You’ll need a piece of paper or card and a small make-up brush. You can steal a suitable one from your wife’s drawer until you can pluck up the courage to buy your own from Poundland! Squirt the base colour (beige red) onto the paper and roll the brush through. Wipe off as much paint as you can as we’re going to dry brush this across the face. I usually test it first on the helmet to check I haven’t got too much paint on the brush – you want very little. Now, using a downwards stroke, dry brush the face. It might help to turn the figure upside down. The reason for always moving the brush downwards is that this will give you your highlights and will help you recognize where to apply paint later on. If you are careful, you can run the brush lightly over the eyes – this gives you eyelids without the need for separate painting.

Step 5:

Repeat the dry brush process but this time with the basic skin tone paint. It’s quite light compared to the beige red. You should use less paint in this step as otherwise you’ll start to lose some of the details. Make sure that the brush is bone dry and has very little paint on it.

Step 6:

It’s time for the whites of the eyes. That phrase is misleading as you shouldn’t actually use white as it’ll be far too bright. I use 70.928 Light Flesh. You’ll need a steady hand. I like to do this step near a window as a good light source is essential. A 0/20 tiny brush is my choice here. Too much paint and you’ll ruin Step 2. If you do mess it up, don’t panic – you might be able to scratch some of the paint up using the pin.

Step 7:

Choose an eye colour (green stands out well). Grab a pin. Steady your nerves with a sip of rum and go for it. Have you camera on your phone ready as it helps to take a picture and zoom in to see if you hit the target. This is probably the hardest step of the painting. The iris needs to be a bit bigger than the pupil. You can either use a slightly larger pin to Step 8 or paint slightly off centre. Having your figure looking in one direction rather than straight ahead is another good effect and is actually a bit easier.

Step 8:

Unfortunately, you’ve got to do the hardest step again – this time with black. And if Step 8 goes well, you could even add Step 8a which would be the reflection in the pupil. I don’t do that in 1/16 scale myself but would in larger figures.

Step 9:

Now we can start painting! Your paint will need to be wet so a wet palette might work for you. I just use a tea cup’s saucer and pool some water in the centre. Let’s go for the darkest areas first with the black red. Cut under the eyelids, create a philtrum under the nose and those lines coming from either side of the nose. Go over any dark bits that your dry brushing shouldn’t have painted.

Step 10:

This is the opposite to 9. We are going to use the light flesh to contrast the dark lines. Think about where the light will strike the face: above the eye sockets, the check bones and both sides of the philtrum. I also like to bring the shape of the lips out now. The cheek bone on the right isn’t so brilliant as his machine gun was right where I wanted to rest my hand! But it doesn’t matter. This step and Step 9 provide the outline now for the proper painting.

Step 11:

Now we have the outline, we know where the paint needs to go and which parts of the face should be dark and which should be light. Mix up a palette of very wet paint. Using the beige red as the base colour in the middle (this is always the colour I use most), create darker variants by adding the burnt red and lighter shades using the basic skin tone. Step 11 is the longest step as you just need to just take your time. I have two brushes in use for this step though. I apply the wet paint with a 0/20 brush but then ‘massage’ it in with a stiff 0 brush. The stiff brush almost wipes the paint off straight away but that’s what we want – small layers of paint at a time. You’ll sometimes lose detail (see the photo) but it comes back with the next swipe. Now my big tip here when using the wet brush to apply the paint is to think about the muscles underneath the skin. If your brushstroke mirrors the direction of the muscle, this will help the effect.

Again, take photos of your work to zoom in. Take a break, walk away and come back to it. It’s a slow process and at times seems like two steps forward, one step back. I go up the dark of the eyes but don’t tend to mess with the eyes during this part of the process unless I need to. Keep that 0 size stiff brush massaging the paint in. Keep that brush bone dry – always!

Step 12:

You might now want to add a small amount of vermillion to the cheeks and gold to the cheeks. It’s not essential but does add some character. Again, on with the wet brush and straight off with the stiff dry brush.

Step 13:

Stubble time! It’s the same process – the paint, which is black mixed with the beige red, should be very watery. You are going to paint the moustache on but the rub it immediately off with the stiff dry brush. You’ll probably need two swipes at this. Don’t make the stubble colour too dark. You can darken it up with another swipe if needed.

You can use this mix to paint the eyebrows too. Don’t use the dry brush for the eyebrows though.

We’re nearly there.

I tend to take another photo at this point and walk away to come back later.

I’ve painted the helmet but I think those cheek bones are too light. But I’d call this face nearly done. I’ll likely come back to it for one more pass after I’ve painted the body.