Exploring Colors - Grey - HC 388

In this Hobby Cheating Tutorial, we return to our Exploring Colors series and we break down the nature of one of the potentially sad and boring colors - grey. Though we often think of this as being a neutral and flat tone, we talk about how you can make it more interesting and utilize it effectively in your miniatures. Hope you enjoy!
0:00 Intro
1:04 Basics
3:00 colors
5:25 Painting
9:05 Color Wheel
14:45 Outro
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[@leonardodosvinci4130]

As an English person I am an expert on grey, we have over 100 words for it.. and I endorse this message.

[@tombrand236]

Same man. Life is monochrome isn’t it?

[@Mikey__R]

May we live in interesting times.

[@PaleoPaleo-gt1ok]

Vince, You deserve nothing but love. Your videos are so rich and saturated in knowledge, they will never be grey.

[@VinceVenturella]

I appreciate that!

[@davidcollins2648]

As an art teacher I applaud your use of the color wheel. It even works with gray! Most paints are too pure in color and a little of the opposite will give you the color you want.

[@MrDraconder]

Grey't stuff. I love using grey in my army, using a cool blue grey skin to contrast the warm oranges I use for armour. Wonderful video!

[@ThimblewolfArt]

I really love blue and purple influenced greys. Especially as fantasy skintones.

[@dakotacouch5642]

Grey purple is one of my favorite colors

[@djsaunter]

A big game changer for me and using grey was making my own greys for edge highlighting black by mixing black with other base colors from the model, like cool jade or warm orange. I'll be picking up one your MH Payne's Greys in my next hobby order. I use Payne's grey all the time in watercolour painting instead of black and it's my go to pigment for shadows.

[@robertwilder4953]

As always, I look forward to my Saturday morning coffee with Vince. Nice job. You just resolved a color choice issue I was having, Thanks!

[@RedHandedDaniel]

I love Grey! almost as much as Brown. I thought I was crazy, trying to sort Vallejo greys by temperature and feeling they were mislabeled. glad I'm not alone.

[@fpoggesi]

I love your Exploring Colors series! Keep 'em coming!

[@VinceVenturella]

Thank you! Will do!

[@vagrant2863]

IMO Grey is amongst the most important colors despite how under appreciated it is. Much like brown actually with how important black and white is to other colors and their values.

[@MaskedRiderChris]

Gray is a color I don't use often enough, and this is something I'm going to challenge myself to do, now. I've already been veering into using lighter grays to highlight in my color blends as opposed to white or off white as is, so logical next step is to go full on with this. Thanks, Vince!

[@wags2656]

I always love the Exploring Colors videos, but this one was perhaps my favorite of them all because it helped improve my competence with all colors.

[@RisingApe]

Love this series Vince, thanks for carrying on making it.

[@VinceVenturella]

More to come!

[@dguen798]

Utilizing only greys on a mini is great practice too. It really puts your highlight and shadow and values to test.

[@dlvnmedia]

Makes me think of that old Cool Mini or Not painting book from 13-14 years ago and that monochromatic Necromancer piece that was included - that was a pretty amazing piece thinking back on it now

[@Mikey__R]

Golden have recently released a range of neutral greys. These are warmer than the cold greys you'd get from mixing black and white. They seem to be aimed at either reducing chroma in mixes or for underpainting.

[@LoftOfTheUniverse]

This is my favorite series that you do. I'd love for part 2 of each color you covered so far and cover more things regarding them!

[@VinceVenturella]

That's a great idea!

[@koriesheffer7120]

So much information just smacked right in there. I find graphite grey from AK to be one of the first paints on my pallet and never really knew why, this makes so much sense

[@nathanlovin]

Thank you for expanding on the best color! Grey has been my favorite since I was kid.

[@VinceVenturella]

You bet!

[@jamesn2830]

Grey is actually my favorite color. I was happy to see a video on this one. Grey is wonderful in a lot of art forms I mean look at how impressive some black and grey professional tattoos are. For something considered bland by some the color can communicate a lot

[@Glatius]

When you were talking about grey being very boring and how our eyes were drawn to hues it was very interesting because try as I might I couldn't really "see" the mini being painted as it felt my eyes were subconciously "stuck" to the very vibrant green (as well as the transition to white) on the base

[@Nick-fh4wd]

I love the highly technical teaching style of your videos Vince. It's perfect for me, I really appreciate you going into the background and history of the colours and where they first appeared in history. Grey might be not the most exciting colour; but I am always excited for your exploring colours videos.

[@fraserskomorowski2311]

Best gray I've used is a mix of Ultramarine blue(PB29) and burnt umber(PBr7). A tiny bit of white and boom, chromatic grey. A tiny bit more blue for a cool grey, tiny bit more umber for the warm hue.

[@christophwinkler9133]

Great, comes very good together with other lectures about the color wheel and how to mix grey from the primary colors :)

[@Wijkert]

1:00 your old favorite for zenithal priming Cold Grey! As you mentioned before in your video's, the name is funny because it's a warm grey. I have a bottle that separated heavily because I premixed airbrush thinner into it for back when I used for zenithal priming too (noticed that premixing like this make the paint separate more, which is fine because it's so thin, a quick vortex mix can get it back to fully mixed fast). The interesting thing about separation especially in a clear bottle, is that you can better tell what colors where used. In this case the reason it feels warm is because there is a decent amount of yellow in Cold Grey. Just though you might like to know.

[@ddstevenson1]

8:41 I love how the gray continually draws the eye away from the most titillating/terrifying parts of the image, transforming what would be merely disgusting into a work of horror

[@eremie2899]

I love Grey though…thanks for showing it some love! ❤

[@stefanblackadder5236]

I’m not a Warhammer genre guy up here near Seattle. I say that because you have, and continue to be a mentor to me. I have learned so much from you. I consider you a friend. Learning how to get better is one of the joys in this hobby. I live for those moments when you paint something and it just “pops”. I’m grateful for the time and effort you give to this community.

[@VinceVenturella]

Thank you! Always happy to help. :)

[@rubenlopezcatalan8661]

Perfect timing…thanks Vince

[@dlvnmedia]

I love the color grey and have most of my clothes in that color or black. Either I am a depressed person a goth nearing 50 an artist or all of the above I thinks. I am also feeling sick as a dog so having new stuff to watch has been great.

[@IrulianDark]

Never thought about it before, but yeah, I don't think I have a single miniature with a grey paint scheme. Going to try that today. Thanks for the video.

[@davidbarker4747]

Vallejo's German Field Grey is a nice greenish undercoat for a lot of things, you see Angel Giralez use it all the time

[@briangilgan]

I've been playing with greys lately. I find that mixing colours into neutral greys is fairly straightforward and reliable but what I can't get a grip on is mixing complements to make a grey. A second part to this grey video covering complement mixing would be a great addition. Maybe I'll have it figured out by then, but probably not :)

[@pauls3585]

An awesome tutorial, Vince. I will give this a try.

[@phigu198]

I love grey. Especially the lighter shades of it, even the plain neutral ones, have such an airy lightness, so this video is great. Unfortunately it's timing for me could have been any worse - I *just* finished my Forgeworld Thranduil last week, a model with a very decent amount of greys.

[@sirbobulous]

I use grey a lot. It's a great substitute for blues to add to an otherwise blue heavy palette while adding some difference to stuff around it. Personally I've been thinking about painting some models inspired by the 'Gems' in 'Steven Universe'. They're geometric and usually single colour but different shades of that colour. So one character might be ONLY blue, but using 6 or 7 different types of blue to separate their features. And I don't mean 'blue-black shadows' ways of 'cheating' blue into the figure. Using deep sea blues as the shadows, etc. so everything is clearly blue if you saw the colour by itself you'd never confuse it for some other colour.

[@alancook1053]

This was so incredibly helpful!! This one goes in the reference file!! By the way you have your own subcategory!!! Lol. Thanks!!!

[@TerrierHalo]

I would pay good money to watch a bunch of you painters play Hues and Cues on stream. :D

[@Bluecho4]

Sometimes the best thing a color can do on a composition is be very dull. Whether that's to convey a dour atmosphere, or to enhance the visual impact of other hues.

[@simonrobinson4761]

8:29 “There’s nowhere else for your eye to go!” Erm, yeah, sure. Let’s go with that... 😂

[@kungdswe2940]

some really good example of using gray and add some colors to draw the attention is the movies sin city and schindlers list.

[@ShameyBaby]

As a Brit, I appreciate the spelling 😉. Thanks for another great video Vince!

[@VinceVenturella]

My pleasure!

[@tombrand236]

Such an interesting video. Thanks Vince!

[@Nogoatsnoglory]

Great work as usual. Was just looking for a video on exactly this, great timing.

[@andrewamann2821]

A note on Payne's Gray: unless you're using it frequently enough to justify buying a bottle or tube of premix, this color is typically a mix of French Ultramarine (PB29) and some flavor of Carbon Black (PBk6), sometimes, but not always, mixed with a Slate gray. You can mix this at home. That said, it makes for a hella good alternative to a simple black wash, in either watercolors or oils, especially over metallics and, oddly enough, flesh tones.

[@Dhrazia]

I use Daler Rowneys ink version and i think i'll never need another. Lifetime supply. It is quite glossy though, as inks tend to be.

[@andrewamann2821]

@@Dhrazia cut it with a couple of drops of matte varnish or matte medium to get rid of the glossiness. Inks are typically made with a higher pigment density, and finer grind, so you're not going to lose much in the way of coverage by doing so, and you're effectively just making paint with it, with the benefit of controlling the properties however you want them. You can also mix them with iridescent medium, or Golden's interference colors, to get some hella nice colored metallics. It almost makes it worth getting a paint knife to mix stuff quickly, especially with more paste-like products.

[@brianmoore4041]

I've been waiting for this one for a while! I love using grays in my painting. Thanks for the video.

[@Wijkert]

One thing that might be good to add is that the reason to add a grey and not a black or white, if we want to desaturate a color, is to keep the value roughly the same. I am sure this is obvious to you Vince, but maybe not for all viewers.

[@billcurran7210]

This is a great tip, can't wait to try this one out.

[@VinceVenturella]

Have fun!

[@TerrierHalo]

I’ve been using grey mostly as stuff that goes over other stuff with contrast or thinned stuff, but I really should experiment more.

[@markgnepper5636]

Great stuff friend 👏 👍

[@6TypoS9]

excellent would watch a 55min vid on this

[@BrianPivik]

Thanks Vince, I love these series of videos! And this and the previous video are very relevant to me as I work on a grey-skinned demon...

[@krzysztofmathews738]

Glad to see this, as it happens that I will almost always pick up something that looks like a grey variant when I am browsing for paints. "What's this? A slightly not as dark as Tamiya's German Field gray, but darker than Golden High flow Neutral grey paint? Gotta have that!"

[@voice9893]

Thanks vince. I am currently working on my fully magnetized Verminlord and painting His fur Grey. It makes his red color pop i might glaze blue in the shadows if i am done. Praise the rat

[@needfoolthings]

My favorite grey is a magenta/neon green mix.

[@tomaszlucjusz113]

8:20 - To keep the comment section family-friendly, let's agree that my eyes focus on the red robe. Anyway, thank you for that video, I've been struggling a lot with grey skin on my ghouls. Somebody is getting repainted soon.

[@VinceVenturella]

Happy to help. :)

[@isisnmagic1812]

Great video the use of the grey has helped as I like the grey sets in my Army and Vallejo paints, but I must say watching the video did make me think of red orange and yellow paints which I try to avoid using. I ordered a Necron overlord figure today and Prussian blue, light and dark grey on the blade came to mind then this video came up in my feed, spooky

[@VinceVenturella]

Always happy to help, i have exploring colors on all of those as well. :)

[@sophovot5079]

Thanks! I really struggle with grey, it always ends up looking like I just did a zenithal prime and forgot to actually paint the grey part. I'll try pushing the colors more

[@DanielRisberg]

But you were the chosen one! You were supposed to FIGHT the grey!

[@-Snapcast-]

I've had a lot of trouble with getting greys how I like them as they always seemed to have to much of a blue tone to them. Lately I've found that mixing brown and grey would give me what I was looking for. I'm odd and don't like blue tones lol

[@echtervogel]

Did you change your setup again? The footage is super crisp and even more legible than usually. Thanks for another great color!

[@VinceVenturella]

Same set-up, just dialing thins in and such.

[@iancw1]

I feel grey would have a little better image in the community if it wasn’t for 99% of models coming on grey sprues. It makes it so you feel you really have to do a really good paint job to not make it look “not painted”.

[@pdubb9754]

In the last year we saw so much grey undercoating via the lapchop technique. I wonder ifthere is value to exploring grey more in this context. Probably someone has and I missed it. It was the color wheel that pushed my brain toward this, how that technique results in color over white, over grey, over black. Maybe that color wheel is all I need to know.

[@Mikey__R]

The difficulty I have, when I want to desaturate a colour: do I go towards grey, or do I go towards brown? I'm never sure which I actually want. The complementary colour will *normally* shift towards brown, but not always. And that's not always what I want.

[@MightyMax2756]

I always enjoy seeing 2d art as reference for mini painting. Do you have a mtg artist you use as inspiration a lot, or just a favorite artist in general

[@VinceVenturella]

I mean I have lots of art and artists I draw on, my favorite MTG artist is Rebecca Guay. :)

[@mrchoochoohead9033]

Imagine a world without grey.... Shaking my head

[@phillharding520]

Came across this video after I painted a grey clock and was thinking how to implement the yellow. Do I mix it into the stonewall grey or go back to cold grey and start working up from there? Kindest regards. Ps keep these videos coming

[@VinceVenturella]

Just mixing it in is generally the easiest way to go. It's a great universal highlight color.

[@nogusta11]

Hi Vince I am glad you did a HC about grey as I want to do a heresy style wolves army but want to push it more than GW's way of doing it could you recommend a base,shade and highlight please for this as I love the way you paint

[@VinceVenturella]

Something like a Reddish grey base throug a mid-tone grey of any kind into a deck tan with a little ice yellow could be a nice scheme.

[@dannythompson9642]

👍👍

[@NFNCDUBSTEP]

Any chance you could have a camera on the palette, paper towel, wash pot as well? I'm trying to figure out the cause and effect of all of those things and how it applies to the paint going on the mini and seeing what you do in reaction to what's going on the mini would help a ton.

[@VinceVenturella]

Sometimes I will show more specifically what is happening and I have videos specifically on paint thinning and control as well as brush control.

[@morganwang7902]

Hi! Somehow this video didn’t make it into the hobby cheating color playlist!

[@MKempICI]

Another useful video. Thank you, sir!

[@NickMK]

Grey is a color I really struggle with for some reason. When I look at my rack of paints and I need a grey for NMM or to highlight black, or to shade white, I always struggle to pick the one that will work, unless its some recipe I have already figured out. I look at citadel Dawnstone and think ...is this warm? Is it cold? Is dark sea grey warmer, colder.. why cant my brain figure this out. Since the color is so umm greyed out... I have trouble seeing the hue (probably not the right word?) in it.

[@grushpea5365]

Hey Vince, are there any tips on making a cheaper mini look better through paintjobs? I have a couple of 3d printed minis and i'm looking at some of the details and just don't see what they're supposed to be. how would you tackle that?

[@VinceVenturella]

The short answer is its really tough. The longer answer is make-up tutorials. That is a masterclass in creating volumes. But strong black lines and creating crisper edges is generally the best way to go.

[@Alexlit15]

Fun little fact about that model. If you look closely at priest's book, you can see the word 'porn' scribbled among random sigils

[@gregoiremallet5751]

Hello Vince, Cool Video .Thanks .Would you please write the name of the artist who 've made the Grey + Red Vampire ? TY

[@VinceVenturella]

Will Hahn.

[@michaelteller7503]

Vince I have a question and this is maybe the worst possible video to ask it on but: given yellow magenta and cyan actually seem to be truer primary colors than RYB, are all the theories about complementary, split complementary, etc. misaligned? Should I use THAT color wheel when looking for good colors to contrast my primary?

[@VinceVenturella]

It actually doesn't matter too much, as long as your consistent. What I mean is as long as you're working consistently within one of the wheels, it will generally work out fine.

[@dsanchez23fight]

Where do you learn so much about colors? Art minor?

[@VinceVenturella]

Nope, just life experience and study.

[@dsanchez23fight]

@@VinceVenturella That's really cool. What sort of study? Any particular artist or books? I want to understand light and colors the way you do without having to rely on you if that makes sense lol

[@VinceVenturella]

@@dsanchez23fight It's really just learning over time, but James Gurney's books are really great, both of them are highly valuable in understanding light and color.

[@dsanchez23fight]

@@VinceVenturella Thanks! I'll look into them.

[@timestop5843]

Grey important in Silver NMM?

[@VinceVenturella]

It's generally a part of the desaturation, but you don't need to stick to just grey for sure.

[@1nfty-]

Where can i find that painting?

[@VinceVenturella]

Which one?

[@1nfty-]

@@VinceVenturella The one with the red hooded woman. The contrast on that is beautiful!

[@TheEnd]

Grey matters 🧠

[@NarcolepticLTD]

Grey is my favorite color! (I feel so symbolic).

[@SgtMaj22]

All hail the KZbin algorithm gods...

[@vixxihlialocke5117]

Has anyone ever told you that you're like the Gordon Ramsay of miniature painting?

[@brayandeutsch6577]

Should have named this video Wait for it 50 shades of Gray now everyone in the audience kill me

[@cultoftheprofits007]

💀