Light up your miniatures
An advanced step to priming miniatures is called Zenithal Priming. This technique utilizes the fact that paint is not completely opaque, to simulate light from the sun when it is at its zenith. After priming the whole miniature with Matt Black, simply spray Matt White only from above, with either a Colour Primer or using an airbrush.
This will leave the recesses and downwards facing areas black and our Warpaints™ or Speedpaint will look brighter when applied to the white areas compared to the black ones creating a natural base shading.
How to paint with a Zenithal Prime
Start by priming your miniatures Matt Black and let it dry completely. Remember to use Colour Primers outside.
Then Matt White Colour Primer spraying only from above. This will leave the recesses and underside of the miniature black. You could also do this step with Warpaints Air through an airbrush.
By painting the miniature with Speedpaint you maximize the effect of the Zenithal highlight and get instantly beautifully shaded miniatures.
Different colours, different effects
You don’t have to use White and Black as your Zenithal Colours. You can combine the idea with our principal of letting the Colour Primers do as much work for you as possible. Here we have primed an orc with Angel Green and the applied Goblin Green from above to get the same effect, and accomplish the first basecoat in the same step.
This is the same principal as our Colour Triads designed for airbrush. You build shadow, midtone & highlight extremely easily.
You can also combine contrasting colours to get unique effects. This monster was primed with Crystal Blue and given a Dragon Red zenithal highlight. Leaving the shadows cool and giving an disgusting looking purple skin with lots of variation.

Using Colour Primers
Priming is an essential part of painting your miniature. With our signature Colour Primers you can save loads of time when painting while ensuring that you have the best possible foundation for a smooth and impressive paint job. In this section we’ll show you the do’s and don’t of priming and talk a bit about why we make our Colour Primers the way we do.
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The Colour Triad system
Using an airbrush can be a great time-saving tool for hobbyists and we’ve made this technique even easier thanks to our unique Colour Triad System. With three colours developed to achieve a rich Base coat, vibrant Mid tone, and bright Highlight – we took the guess work out of colour selection for you.
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Pick a colour scheme
The most influential part of your painting process has little to do with actual technique or application. Selecting the right colour scheme plays a huge role in how your finished product will look – and how quickly you will be able to finish it.
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Object Source Lighting
Most miniatures rely on a zenith light source from above the miniature. But, what happens if you change the light source, or add an additional light source to your model? Let’s talk about Object Source Lighting.
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Wash tips & tricks
The wash technique is talent-in-a-bottle for many painters but thanks to the heavy pigmentation and unique formulation of our Quickshade Washes – the simple wash is just the beginning of what’s possible. Let’s learn some tecniques that help get the most out off the washing step…
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