Hobby Cheating 225 - Exploring Colors - Blue 

Wow, I've been gone from the miniature painting for a little while, and I gotta say: This exploring colors series is one of the most useful of all your videos. A+. Awesome as usual, cheers!

The breadth of your nerdom is fascinating 😂 I always learn something from you, hobby related or otherwise. Thanks for another insightful video!

Vince. I simply love this series. I'm learning so much. The painting videos I return to most often.

By the gods Vince, you know soooo much about colours and colour theory and then you know how to work with them. Superb video... as always!! Please keep it up!! Thank you.

Wow! I love these color studies. Thanks you are helping me a lot understanding them. I am pretty artistically chalenged so this cerebral way of presenting color is a big help.

Another eye opening video, thank you Vince. I was wondering if you could talk about or even better do a tutorial on Earth Sky NMM. That 80's chrome style so popular in comics and Heavy Metal Magazine.

Regarding language and color, in Russian, what we consider light blue and dark blue are considered as different as (say) red and yellow. The words for the two and the way native speakers see them are very different in a way that they are not to native speakers of English.

Painting skin tones with oils. I know you touched on this before but maybe do an updated video with more human tones. I know you love painting skin so this probably isn’t a huge ask

Great video - I’ve been rewatching the whole colour series and making notes. So would you say it’s hard to make a visually interesting cold shadow for blue? I think you said that both Payne’s grey and darksea blue lacked interest

I love having these videos pop up every Saturday. It's like I'm auditing a painting course at a local college. This was fascinating as always, thanks Vince.

I think I am on my third round of the color series. Still learning something. Love it!

Any tips on painting sky blue? I'm planning on painting a Blood Bowl team using Manchester City's colors as inspiration. I bought some Amsterdam Ink Sky Blue. But I have a feeling because it has white in it, the ink will be more opaque than I want.

As a red/green challenged person, I'd think blue must have become a requirement as we began to perceive colors for decoration, instead of only indicative of foliage and edibility.

I find you to be a fantastic teacher. Thank you.

REALLY love the color series! Thanks for making these videos and demystifying mini painting. Just painted my first mini's (to my husband's delight). They aren't great, but it was fun and I'm excited for more.

Blue pigment, especially the lapis lazuli derived ultramarine, were so expensive that artists had to cost those separately in their itemized bills. I was shown medieval book illuminations where the blue pigment was stolen, simply by scraping it off the parchment. The best quality lapis lazuli ultramarine pigments still cost more than €20 per gram!

thank you vince. the color exploring is my favorite videos. i like to watch them before i start painting, you make playing with color so easy

Goes great with the morning coffee! Thank you for the lesson, Sir!😎

People who can't distinguish between blue and green see more shades of brown. It's a hunting adaptation that we have lost over time. Once apon a time, it was more important to see a tiger in tan grass than the difference between blue and green.

When you stick the bright blue and bright orange next to each other you get literally every action movie poster ever.

This is looking a lot like the way you approached gray flesh.

Hey Vince, love your videos and they really helped me so far. I have like two figures aprox 1:16th scale to paint up. They are super heroines in those tight spandex suits. I've watched your video on busts, but do you got some advise beyond that for my specific project?

Thanks Vince How about Prussian blue? Looks very much like flat blue to me. What do you think?

Poor Juan Hidalgo.... he does not love the future ) Anyway thanks A LOT returrning on minis after having stopped before Necron exist ( 1994 I think) You help me so much Thanks again from Brittany - France

I love these color exploration videos :) so much knowledge and usefulness.

First, thank you for doing this series; I love these videos. I have a question parallel to this lesson: If I'm painting white using cool tones (blues), can I still use the examples for shading blue? Do they still apply? Do I use desaturated blues? For example, I paint space marines with white armor (Luna Wolves). Instead of using Ulthuan Grey, I use Corax white and Blue Horror, shading with thinned Thunderhawk Blue. Is this something different? And if it is a different use case, do you have a video to explain?

Great video! Came back to it, because I'm in a process of painting Kairos and am blocked with his blue skin parts. I've used VGC Imperial Blue as my midtone, for highlighting I'm going to add Ice Yellow, but I wasn't sure about shadows. I've tried to use VGC Dark Blue (it's on the purple spectum, really like it for shading my Space Wolves baby blue armor). I'm going to use oil paints to add shadows (my air humidity might be so low that waterbased paints dry too fast to feather them out correctly). I'm not sure if it'll work well, but I'll experiment with colors I have to get nice purple and add it to my blue. I really like Exploring Colors series. Helped me to get nicer highlights in my purple and violet. Thank you, Vince!

I was checking my minis And on my newly painted squad (which is the best so far continuously improving here) I was like: still something feel too flat! Ok let’s go to Vince he will again teach me something I’m missing! And of course Bingo! Next step highlights my blue by mixing a yellowish white and see if it help :) Thank you!

Vince, at 14:11, are you layering a brighter highlight over the existing one, or are you just cleaning up your original highlight after shading? Or both?

There is no "exploring turquoise" video yet, so am posting my question here. I am painting my demon army in a icy color scheme. My main colors are turquoise (closing in on blue) and white. On some of my test models I have used deep turquoise for the shadows (done with the airbrush), which looks decent enough, but am wandering if there is a more spicier/interesting option. Any idea's?

Excellent video - I found you need to be very careful layering up dark blues with mid blues - some have a really strong purple undertone whiilst others contain a lot of green. Playing around with metallics and blues is fun - swapping silver for copper for example.

The blue thing is true! Though not quite settled yet, the leading theory is that blue was considered a shade of grey, rather than being its own color, but pre-Lapis Lazuli people could very much still differentiate the shades of it from grey. Very weird to think of nowadays, I agree! There are some modern parallels though! There are languages today that don't have a word for pink, and instead still call it red. As well as languages that have two words for blue and/or green, and so classify them differently than most English speakers. It's pretty neat!

I've been really loving all of these in-depth colour breakdowns.

I'm having difficulty with stark transitions when glazing light/sky blue. Am I understanding the lesson here correctly that the better approach is to glaze down to my midtones and shadows, rather than glazing up to my highlights? Thanks

Man, I wish I had watched this before I started painting my Thousand Sons army.. for the longest time I've been wondering why it's so hard to get smooth gradients with the blues I've been using

You just told me that all my loved PanOceanians look wrong. I had to make a decision: I will NOT like you anylonger - until your next video :-D

Hello Vince, can you please recommend me a vibrant blue paint like the one on the Dominion boxcover art? Thank you!

in Chinese language they only had black, white and red as words for colours, afaik. Brown is 'coffee colour' for example.

I thought blue would be the color where I don't learn much new. But as always with your videos I learned a lot. Thanks!

blue okok its fine thanks for tips

What are your thoughts on dark saturated blues? Something like a prussian blue is one of my favorite colors for blue, but they might be more for midtones on something that I indeed to look dark blue.

Sorcery! You're in Aus! Teaching us and commentating Cancon! :D

great vid. blue is definately a deceptively hard colour to get right. its easy to get it ok, it tends to cover better than red, it doesnt go pink so you can slam white/black into it and it remains blue to the eye, so it has a good rep with the beginner painter vs a colour like red or yellow. but actually, straight blue simply highlighted with white, we dont have a different name, its not 'pink', but its often just as bad as pink when u really look at it. its a horrible cheap blue, and to get a really interesting great blue you have to get in the trenches with it like you do a red, you got to pull the shadow a bit towards purple, the highlight a bit towards yellow, and that can sometimes get a bit strange in terms of your shadows then becoming 'warmer' than your highlights. when u do it with red the blue tint in the shadow and yellow tint in the highs creates a colder shadow which often feels more 'correct', if that word can be applied to art.

I remember that you introduced me to Huldra Blue, one of my all time favorites.

I really like to use Contrast paints for blue shadows. Especially if used with an airbrush. You can build up saturation and lightness this way very easily. I usually use akhelian green (yeaaah, green again) for this purpose.

Exploring Flourescents and how to get the best from them in a variety of situations. Like in stark contrast as emissive lighting say on plasma weapons. Or for taking a colourful piece that little bit further. Or greying down a model, desaturating its colour from the start, only to bring in flourescents in small areas to emphasise the brightness and loud vivid colour.

Does anyone know about the articles he mentioned? I dont think I see the links in the description 🤔

Would you consider doing brown next? I could use some tips on brown, I think... Maybe... It's brown, I guess. ARGGGHH!

Very informative video, I'm taking notes!

I'll echo everyone else's comments and say that I love this series and it's teaching me so much, great content Vince. I'm painting a bunch of Squig Hoppers with a Blue Squig and Yellow Robes theme, so having watched and tried to absorb both the Yellow and Blue videos, I decided that a Warm Zenithal Highlight of VSP German Red Brown, VMA Light Rust, VMA Skin Tone, Wash with GW Carroburg Crimson and Dry Brush with VMC Pale Sand would be a great base for both my Iyandan Yellow (it is) and a Blue Contrast Paint (I tried several but it wasn't) they all either obliterate the underpainting or go quite green (depending on my thinning) and not the popping happy blue squig colour that I'm after - Any tips?

Woohoo! Free CANCON painting lesson!

Came for the color theory, stayed for the color puns.

Video Request / Product Review: Vallejo Model Washes Obviously you love Vallejo Model Wash Dark Gray and I've started using that based on your recommendation and really enjoying it. I assume you have used the other but I haven't ever seen you mention them so I'm guessing you're not a big fan? Some of your quick thoughts would be nice before I start throwing money around.

Hey Vince, since I've been mixing artists oil colours, I've learnt that everything I know about brown and grey is a lie! I never knew you could mix grey from complimentaries. Could I request a video on the neutrals?

Juan Hidalgo is not amused by this video

My perception of blue improved a lot after I had cataract surgery in one eye (I'm not that old but apparently my eyes are. Blame the Australian sun). And in general I can pick a red-biased blue more easily than a green-biased blue, like I can look at a car and think "ah ultramarine" but if it leans more pthalo or Prussian Blue I don't really see the green in there without concentrating. I love this series. Colour is endlessly fascinating.

Vince do you have a favorite blue ink wash?

this is great!

Last night I tried blending with a sky blue highlight over a royal blue, and ran into exactly what you described here. Fortunately, I knew who to turn to :) "Let us get to the technique and learn it Vincy-V style!" -Jon These color studies are brilliant, thanks for making them!

Doing a lot of Bright, fully saturated blue and orange in equal measure could possibly work together OK in the context of something like a quadranted human Empire uniform. The puffy pants and such. Possibly. You think?

Would you consider reviewing/demoing/exploring the uses of Stuart Semple's LIT pigment on miniatures?

I've struggled so much trying to make my Ultramarines interesting......then Vince comes along. The ice yellow and skin tone are genius.

Hey ! I just watched your 3 videos about exploring colors... that is EXACLTY the kind of video that can make me level up ! Color theory is really important. I paint for some years now and altought I can see I improved my raw skills, my minis still feel like... meh. I will defenitly use your precious wisdom to go deeper in color comprehension! As you said you will talk about other colors, I'm looking forward to watch your videos about purple and yellow :) Blue thumb, bell and following activated :D Thx you Mister Venturella ! :)

Hey Vince, I am a bit confused by warm vs cool blues. You said on the video that mixing blue and Ice Yellow gives you warm highlights, tinting the blue towards green. I've read on the internet that blues that lean towards purple are considered warm and greenish blues are considered cooler. Wouldn't this mean that mixing in yellow makes the highlight cooler than the base color?

I'm enjoying your videos so much! They've become sth of a morning ritual along with my coffee! Thank you!

Very cool color theory type stuff

hello vince, thanks for the video. What kind of ink you would use to highlight TMM metallic blue? I tried some blue shaded green ink and it was still super stark... thanks in advance

Purple's are my go to for "rich" blues and reds. But -10 pts for not making the flesh highlight!

The part with highlighting is great. I was just struggling with my blue admech yesterday. Thanks for the advices!!!

Very concise explanation. It's always a pleasure for me watching your exploring colors series.

Hey Vince. I was going to buy some warcolours to paint some space marines, and i was wondering wich of their blue ranges youd recommend. And what purple for highlighting the blue?

Hopefully my Ultramarines will benefit from this video. GW Macragge blue, Nuln Oil, Calgar blue edge highlighting works and gives pop but it is tedius to do on ultramarines.

Thank Vince, for Nighthaunt Gloom, a dark, desatured blue-green like that, if i want to make it brighter, i should add light skin tone or ivory right ?

Thanks Vince! This continues to be a lovely, very interesting series. I can't get my brain to unthink "dark sea blue" being green, but that's just a minor "me" thing. ;-) Though if you have other suggestions for "slightly less desaturated dark blues", I'm all ears. Here's one question: I have a bottle of midnight blue, which is a very staurated, very dark blue, and I couldn't find a use for it. Do you have any suggestion of what I could go ahead and do with the thing? I thought and tried a few things, but I always see my shadows as de-saturated... I'd need naturally dark blue clothes to use the bottle, and I'd be in trouble to find shadows for them. And another question: in your video about shiny black armor, you suggested we use a light, desaturated blue for the almost highest highlights (and I thought it was magic ;). Were we in retrospect doing something difficult because that color is a bit harder to blend (because of its whitiness)? Thanks fort the tips! I really now have to get that ice yellow you've been using... Which may mean breaking my vow of loyalty to ivory (just a bit!) :-)) Oh, and for the history of blue - I would also believe blue was a harder pigment to produce for early civilizations - or was it? Enjoy your week-end!

As someone who loves blue as well as orange, thank you for all the detailed information! I love the color combo but it can look gaudy.

I've been playing with a really dark purple FW ink. It's nice and transparent and adds some nice warmth to it. Seems to work pretty well with green as well.

Any good recommendation for Ultramarine paint?

I have been having a problem shading and highlighting blue, but thanks to this, problem solved. Cheers.

So glad to have found this series! I’m coming up on the one year mark of my painting journey soon and decided I’d find a new model to mark the year and see how far I’ve come! I bought some Tyranids warriors last week and have been working to find a colour scheme I like to feature on a tyranid prime. I found a blue skin was what I was going for and this is super useful! Gonna be fun to compare it to my first model!

How do you decide cold or warm?

A video devoted to my favourite colour :) Also don't be alarmed by the number of dead kangaroos by the road in the bush capital ;)

Great video! But I can’t find the links mentioned at the beginning, concerning the “history” of blue: any chance to see them posted in the description?

When you said that people may not see the sky as blue unless you tell them - i had to pause the video and sit for a moment cause my mind was too blown. Omg, love this series so much. Can't wait to see what color you do next.

If anyone comes along and sees this, on a relatively old video, I’m wondering what colours or techniques would be best to highlight and shade Scalecolor’s Sky Blue. It’s such a beautiful colour-my very favourite-and I’m a little bit *precious* about getting it to look stunning. Possibly Cantabric Blue for shade? (Thanks)

Another brilliant video and very insightful. Great work 🙌

Thanks foe the video!!!

Perfect timing Vince, I'm just starting out on a Nighthaunt army and this will be invaluable.

Vince, could you post the links to the sky not being interpreted as blue

Hello Vincent, is it possible to contact you via social media? I have written you on facebook, but I am not sure if you are still using facebook. Anyways much love from Germany! Keep up the great work :)

Wow it is such an informative video. Helped me a lot. Is there a chance, you could make a video about painting KO airships? Since they are so large they don't "act" the same when being painted. They tend to look flat...

Thanks for the video, very interesting tips on mixing for highlight and shade. In fine art it is a common pratice to shade with the complementary color. What do you think of shading blue with adding orangevto the mix? In watercolor, there is a premium on using single pigment paints, as mixes tend to get "muddy" and loose vividness when mixing 4 or more pigments. Is it different when using acrylic? Many watercolor styles revolve on using high intensity pigments on white paper and using transparency. Which is admitedly different than miniatures painting.

Always appreciate these videos

Thanks for your video ur one of the best out there

Awesome! Thanks so much Vince!!

Really interesting, thanks a lot for this!

Hugely useful, thank you!

The sky's blue? 🤯

Is there an exploring purple, yet?

"Traditional white." Why do americans say "traditional" when you mean "usual" or "ordinary"? Don't you have traditions in your country?

I've just started building my paint options, I've noticed my vallejo seems very thick. Do you thin yours in the bottle at all? If so what do you use?