Personally, I love them on some parts of miniatures and hate them on other parts. But what I really hate about them, is having to paint edge highlights. It is one of the most fiddly, time consuming parts of painting a model. Your brush tip must be near perfect, your paint should be diluted to get a nice flow but not too thin and some area's are really, really hard to reach and not paint on other parts!
That is why, dear readers, in this article I will tell you how I cheat my edge highlights.
In historical scale model you see people using graphite pencils to create metallic welds and edges. This gave me an idea and I set out to my art store to buy artists watercolor pencils.
I used a pencil sharpener to get rid of the protective coating on the tip. Now, as you would with a brush, run the side of the tip over all your edges. Its really quick and easy! You can even erase errors using an eraser or a wet brush. You won't have to mind paint drying in the tip of your brush or paint drying on your palette.
** Make sure to varnish after applying the edge highlights. The watercolor pencil is not very durable!**
Some examples of my first trial run:
Overall I think this is about four times faster then using paint. I bought a bunch of different colors so I can have several stages of edge highlights.
The watercolor pencils could also be used to draw a sketch for if you want to freehand. You can blend out the pencil drawing with a wet brush or just paint over it.
I hope this quick article helped some of you.
If it did, feel free to share your experience in the comments!
As always, thank you for reading and hobby on!