The first miniature usually sits on the desk for a week before anyone opens the paint. The box art looks impossibly clean. The faces are tiny. Every guide assumes a drawer full of brushes and a vocabulary of mediums and glazes. So the model waits, and the hobby feels further away than it is.
Painting a miniature is a craft with a short list of steps. Prime the model, thin the paint, block in the main colors, add depth with a wash, catch the edges with a drybrush, and seal it. That is the whole loop. Everything else, from blending to freehand, is an elaboration on those six moves.
This guide is for the first model, not the tenth. It covers how to choose something forgiving, what to buy and what to skip, how to avoid the common beginner failures, and how to finish a figure that looks good on the table without chasing a competition standard.
Choose a Forgiving First Miniature
The model you choose determines how much the process teaches you and how much it punishes you. A good first subject has a simple silhouette, broad surfaces, and few tiny details. A barbarian, an orc, a large animal, a robot, or a tree creature all work. A wizard with a thin staff, a face full of straps, and a cloak covered in runes does not.
Scale matters too. Larger models are easier to hold, easier to see, and easier to correct. If you already own a board game with miniatures, pick a duplicate or a disposable grunt rather than the hero character. Many dungeon crawler sets include several identical figures, which gives you room to practice without risking a favorite. This guide to plastic miniatures for dungeon crawls is a useful overview of the kinds of figures that come in those boxes.
Clean the model before you prime it. Remove mold lines with the back of a hobby knife or a fine file, and wash the figure in warm soapy water to remove release agent. Skip this step and the primer may bead or flake later.
The Short Tool List
You do not need much to start, and buying less is a feature. A single decent brush in a size that holds a point, a smaller brush for detail, a can of primer, a black or brown wash, a matte varnish, a palette, a water pot, and a handful of acrylic paints will carry a first project.
A few additions are worth the money. A wet palette keeps paint workable for longer and makes thinning easier. A cheap desk lamp with a daylight bulb helps you see what you are doing after dark. A handle or a lump of sticky tack on a pill bottle gives you something to hold that is not the model itself.
Skip the expensive brush set, the airbrush, and the full paint range for now. A beginner needs five or six colors that work together, not forty. If you are painting a warband, choose a shared palette; a coherent collection reads better than a varied one.
Prime With Patience
Primer gives the acrylic something to grip and establishes the value of the shadows. A light gray or white primer makes colors brighter and is easier for beginners to see. A black primer hides mistakes and suits darker schemes but can swallow detail if the coats are heavy.
Shake the can for a full minute, and warm it in a bowl of warm water if the weather is cold. Spray in short passes from about six to eight inches away, starting the spray before the model and finishing after it. Two thin coats are better than one wet coat. Humidity and cold affect spray primer, so if the weather is wrong, use a brush-on primer indoors with ventilation.
The most common error is spraying too close and filling the details. A primed model should still show every edge and recess clearly.
Thin Your Paint
Thinning is the single habit that separates a smooth first model from a lumpy one. Acrylic paint straight from the pot is usually too thick for miniature surfaces. It fills recesses, leaves brush marks, and dries with a texture that obscures detail.
Put a little paint on the palette and add water a drop at a time until it flows like milk. The exact ratio depends on the paint and the color, so judge by feel rather than by a formula. Load the brush lightly, touch it to a paper towel if it is too wet, and apply two thin coats rather than one opaque one. Let the first coat dry before the second.
If the paint pools in a recess, wick it away with a dry brush before it dries. If it dries chalky, the paint was too thin or the layer was applied over a tacky surface. Both problems are fixable, and neither ruins the model. Speed paints and contrast-style paints are an exception: they are designed to go on heavy over a light primer and do their own shading, which makes them a legitimate shortcut for a first project.
Basecoat: Block In the Big Shapes
Basecoating is not about precision. It is about establishing where each material lives: skin, cloth, metal, leather, wood. Work one color at a time across the whole model, and start with the colors that cover the largest areas. Leaving the primer visible in the deepest recesses is useful, because those gaps become your shadows later.
Paint from the inside out. Do the face and the chest before the cloak that overlaps them, and the cloak before the straps that sit on top. This order means you can correct an edge by painting over it with the layer that belongs in front, rather than trying to sneak a brush behind a finished piece.
Do not worry about perfect coverage on the first pass. A second thin coat over a patchy area is normal. What matters is that the model reads clearly from arm's length. If you can tell at a glance which part is the shirt and which is the belt, the basecoat is doing its job.
Wash: Depth With One Pass
A wash is thin, dark paint that settles into recesses and leaves the raised areas lighter. It is the fastest way to make a basecoated model look three-dimensional. A brown wash over skin and leather, a black wash over metal, and a dark green or blue wash over cloth will cover most of a first figure.
Apply the wash across a whole area with a moderate load, then wick away any pool that forms on a flat surface. Let it dry completely before judging the result. Washes look alarming while wet and much better after twenty minutes. If the finish is glossy, that is normal; the varnish at the end will flatten it.
A wash is not a substitute for contrast: it darkens recesses but does not lighten raised areas. If the model looks muddy afterward, the fix is a light drybrush or a return pass with the base color, not another layer of wash.
Drybrush: Edges and Highlights
Drybrushing adds a lighter color to raised edges and textured surfaces. Load a dry brush with paint, then wipe most of it off on a paper towel until almost nothing comes off. Brush lightly across the detail. The paint should catch the ridges and leave the recesses alone.
Use a color one or two steps lighter than the base, not white. White drybrush is the classic beginner mistake: it makes every surface look dusty and flattens the color. On fur, chainmail, stone, and hair, a gentle drybrush is transformative. On smooth cloth and skin, it is usually too coarse.
Keep a dedicated drybrush that you do not mind ruining. The technique is hard on bristles, and a good detail brush will splay quickly if you use it this way. If the result looks chalky, the brush was too wet or the paint too thick.
Varnish and Handling
Varnish protects the paint from the handling that miniatures receive. A matte varnish keeps the finish natural; a satin varnish is slightly more durable and has a subtle sheen. Apply two thin coats rather than one heavy coat, and let each dry fully.
Spray varnish has the same weather constraints as spray primer. Brush-on varnish is slower but more controllable, and it is the better choice in a small apartment or during a humid week. Whichever you use, test it on a painted sprue or a disposable figure first, because some varnishes can frost in cold or damp conditions.
After varnishing, store the figure somewhere it will not rub against others. A compartment box or a foam tray prevents the chips that happen when loose metal and plastic knock together. The same habits that protect board game components apply to painted figures: the paint is durable, not indestructible.
Mistakes, Perfectionism, and a First-Session Checklist
Your first miniature will have a visible brush stroke, a patch where the wash pooled, and an eye that looks slightly wrong. This is normal and does not matter. The goal of the first model is to complete the loop: prime, basecoat, wash, drybrush, varnish. A finished imperfect figure teaches more than an unfinished perfect one.
Two habits keep perfectionism in check. First, work to a tabletop standard: the model should look good from a foot away, not under a magnifier. Second, paint a test figure or a spare part before committing a scheme to a whole squad. If you dislike the colors, you have lost an hour, not a warband.
Here is the first-session checklist:
- Clean mold lines and wash the model.
- Prime in two thin coats and let them cure.
- Block in three to five base colors, working inside out.
- Apply one wash, wick the pools, and let it dry fully.
- Drybrush one textured area with a lighter tone.
- Varnish in two thin coats.
When the figure is done, put it on the table and play a session with it. A painted figure that has been used is worth more than a perfect one that stays in the box. If you enjoy the process, the next model can add a new technique; if you do not, a painted warband still looks better than bare plastic. For a sense of what those figures look like in play, this overview of dungeon crawler games for RPG fans is a good place to start.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much does it cost to start painting miniatures?
A starter setup can be modest: a few brushes, a can of primer, five or six paints, a wash, and a varnish. You do not need an airbrush or a full paint range. Buying a small set and adding colors as a project demands them keeps the cost down.
Do I need to prime miniatures before painting?
Yes. Primer gives the acrylic a surface to grip and prevents the paint from rubbing off. Two thin coats from a spray can or a brush-on primer are enough. Clean the model first so the primer does not bead on mold release.
Why does my paint look lumpy or chalky?
The paint is probably too thick, or you are applying one heavy coat instead of two thin ones. Thin the paint toward a milk-like consistency, load the brush lightly, and let each coat dry. Chalky results can also come from painting over a tacky layer.
What is the difference between a wash and a drybrush?
A wash is thin dark paint that settles into recesses to create shadow. A drybrush is a light paint applied with a nearly dry brush to catch raised edges. Used together, they add depth quickly. A wash alone darkens; a drybrush alone lightens.
How long does it take to paint a first miniature?
A simple figure can be finished in two or three short sessions, allowing for drying time. Most of the elapsed time is waiting, not painting. A single session of an hour is usually enough for the basecoat if the model is not overly detailed.
See Also
- 10 Miniature Figures Recommendations for Dungeon Masters in 2026
- 10 Must-Have Plastic Miniatures for Dungeon Crawl Adventures in 2026
- We Tested 50 Terrain and Miniatures Sets - Here are the 10 Best for Thematic Play in 2026
- 10 Most Durable Fantasy Miniatures Based on Real User Reviews in 2026
- 10 Game-Changing Dungeon Crawler Board Games for RPG Fans in 2026