How to Prime your miniatures effectively

This short tutorial will help you learn the best techniques for priming your models in preparation for painting. Generally, white, black, or gray is used as a primer color. Some miniature painters choose not to prime their miniatures, but this isn’t recommended for beginners.

Firstly, you’ll want to make sure your miniature is properly prepped for painting. Learn how to prep your miniatures over at this post.

Black or White?

Color choice for primer color is a hotly debated topic. To keep it simple though, we’ll just stick with a couple of principles.

• Prime your model white if you want the end result to have vivid bright colors. Shading will be more difficult and time consuming.
• Prime your model black if your final color scheme will have darker, earthy tones. Shading is easier, as you can get away with using the black in the recesses of the model as shade. This makes black a much more friendly primer color for beginner painters.

This Descent Golem was primed black. The outward facing areas of the rocks that make up his body were painted varying shades of gray. The recesses were not painted, leaving the black primer for the color of the shaded areas of his body.