KillaK · Paint Coach Beginner · 5-print batch

How to paint your five prints

Wolverine, Bart-Cyclops, Sonic, Mario and Yveltal — a full plan to paint all five as well as you can with the kit you've got, plus exactly what to buy to take them further. Colour maps to your paints, the order to do them in, and how long each stage needs to dry. I'll be straight with you where the kit falls short and give you an easy path on every one.

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Read this first — two honest things

1. The pictures you have are the studio reference renders — the target look, not your raw prints. This guide gets you as close to those as the kit allows.

2. Your paint is Army Painter Speedpaint 2.0 — brilliant one-coat stuff, but I don't know the exact pot names in your starter box. I've mapped everything by colour. Send me a photo of your pots (or read me the names) and I'll pin the exact "use this pot for that" for all five. Two colours Speedpaint is weak at — flat white and bright red — are flagged where they bite.

AThe five golden rules (read once, never forget)

Thin your paint. Two thin coats always beat one thick one. Thick paint clogs the detail and dries lumpy. Speedpaint already flows — don't add more on top of a wet coat.
Let each layer dry before the next (times are on every step). Rushing is how you get smudges and paint lifting off.
Less on the brush. Load it, then wipe the excess on kitchen roll before it touches the model. A dry-ish brush is a controlled brush.
Mistakes aren't fatal. Let it dry, go back over it. Nobody nails their first model — and you've got five, so you'll visibly improve across them.
Good light, water pot, kitchen roll within reach. That's the whole studio.

BHow Speedpaint works — the method behind all five

Every model below follows the same rhythm. Learn it once here, then each character just tells you which colour goes where.

Prep the print 10 min + dry fully

Trim support nubs and seams with the hobby knife, file back the worst layer lines. Then wash the model in a drop of washing-up liquid, rinse, let it dry completely. Prints hold greasy residue that stops paint gripping — two minutes now saves a flaky finish later.

Prime dry 30–60 min · overnight ideal

Outdoors or well-ventilated, model on a box. Can ~20–30 cm away, spray in short thin passes, turning as you go — do not soak it (pooling drowns detail). Two light passes is plenty.

Grey vs white — this matters for these five. Speedpaint is see-through, so the primer colour underneath changes how bright it looks. Over your grey primer the colours come out muted / moody — perfect for Yveltal. But the four bright cartoons (Sonic, Bart, Mario, Wolverine's yellow) look far punchier over white. A £11 can of white primer is the single biggest upgrade for this batch. No white? Grey still works, colours just sit a shade darker.

Basecoat with Speedpaint — one colour at a time 20–40 min each

Flood one Speedpaint colour over its area and leave it — it self-shades, pooling darker in the recesses on its own. That's the magic; don't brush it back and forth or you'll get streaks. Do the biggest / lightest areas first, let each dry before the neighbouring colour so they don't bleed. A slightly wobbly edge now gets tidied later.

Details & the fiddly bits 15–20 min between coats

Now the Series 7 sable earns its money — eyes, small colour zones, sharp edges, freehand. Whites and reds may need 2–3 thin coats (they're translucent). Brace your wrist on the table. Over the line? Let it dry, tidy it back with the neighbouring colour. Patience beats a shaky rush.

Shade with a wash — the magic step dry 20–40 min

Brush Nuln Oil (black — armour, metal, cool shadows) or Agrax Earthshade (brown — skin, brick, wood, leather) into the deep recesses only. It runs into the cracks and shadow just appears. Don't slop it everywhere — target the crevices. Washes look patchy and shiny while wet; let it fully dry before you judge it — it settles matt and clean.

Toon vs realistic: the cartoons (Sonic, Bart, Mario) want little to no wash — they read best flat and bright. The realistic pair (Wolverine's face, Yveltal) love the wash. Match the amount to the look.

Varnish — always last 2 light coats · cure overnight

Everything bone dry first. Same spray technique as primer: light coats from ~25 cm, two thin passes beat one heavy (heavy varnish frosts — goes cloudy white). Your kit varnish is matt, which is right for all five. The one thing matt can't do is a wet, glassy eye or lens — see the shopping list for the cheap gloss fix.

CThe batch plan — paint them in this order

Do the easy ones first to build your hand, finish on the boss. By Wolverine's face you'll be a different painter than you are at Sonic.

Order	Model	Why here	Difficulty
1st	Sonic	Few colours, flat toon, forgiving — the perfect warm-up	Easy
2nd	Bart-Cyclops	Big flat blocks of colour, cartoon-clean	Easy
3rd	Mario relief	Loads of colours but all flat, and it lies flat so it's easy to hold	Medium
4th	Yveltal	Drama piece — a bit of freehand and one colour blend	Medium+
5th	Wolverine bust	A realistic face, fine two-tone suit and metal claws — the boss	Hard

DThe five, one at a time

Sonic

clean toon · your warm-up

Easy

Blue — body, head, arms-back Tan — belly, muzzle, arms, inner ears White — gloves, shoe cuffs Red — shoes Black — eyes, nose

Prime — white if you have it (keeps that blue bright), grey is fine. dry overnight
Blue body — flood Speedpaint blue over everything blue, leave it to self-shade in the quills and limbs. Keep it off the tan front. 30–40 min
Tan front — belly, muzzle, arms and inner ears in a tan/flesh tone. A touch of Agrax in the ear-hollows if you want depth. 30 min
White gloves & shoe cuffs — 2–3 thin coats (white is see-through). 15 min/coat
Red shoes — with the white stripe left clean; tiny gold dot on the buckle. 20 min
The eyes — the whole model lives or dies here. White ovals, then the two black pupils joined in the middle (Sonic's signature connected eyes), black nose, one tiny white shine dot. Sable brush, wrist braced. 15 min/coat
Varnish matt. cure overnight

Just want it done Prime → blue → tan front → white gloves → red shoes → black eyes & nose → varnish. Skip washes entirely — Sonic is meant to be flat and bright.

Make it better A thin black cel-line where the blue meets the tan (the way the cartoon is outlined) instantly makes it read like a proper Sonic — thinned black on the sable, or a fine-liner pen. And a gloss dot on each eye makes him look alive.

Kit gap Speedpaint white and red are thin — the gloves and shoes are where you'll feel it. An opaque white + red (see shopping list) fixes it in one coat instead of three.

Bart-Cyclops

Simpsons × X-Men · flat blocks

Easy

Yellow — skin, gloves, boots, belt, harness Blue — the bodysuit Red — visor, open mouth White — teeth Grey — cracked-stone base

Prime white if you possibly can — Simpsons yellow over grey goes murky. White under it keeps it that bright cartoon yellow. dry overnight
Yellow — skin, gloves, boots, belt and harness. Keep it flat and bright — go easy on any wash, cartoons don't want realistic shadow. 30–40 min
Blue bodysuit — flood the suit, self-shades in the folds. 30 min
Red visor + open mouth, teeth white, the little tongue red. 20 min
Black line under the visor and around the mouth with the sable — that crisp outline is what makes it read cartoon. 15 min
Base — grey stone, then a light-grey drybrush to catch the cracks; the X roundel in blue. 20 min
Varnish matt. cure overnight

Just want it done Prime white → yellow → blue → red visor → black mouth line → varnish. That's a clean, sharp Cyclops-Bart with zero shading needed.

Make it better Gloss the visor only — a wet red lens against the matt body is the detail that sells it. A whisper of orange Speedpaint in the deepest yellow folds adds shape without killing the flat cartoon look.

Kit gap This one is all about the yellow, and yellow is the colour that suffers most over grey primer — white primer is close to essential here for the bright result.

Mario wall relief

many colours, all flat · lies flat = easy to hold

Medium

Red — hat, shirt, mushroom caps Blue — overalls Skin — face Brown — hair, moustache, brick Green — pipes Yellow — buttons, ? block Gold — coins, star White — M badge, mushroom spots

Prime white (lots of bright colours here). Note the mount/keyhole on the back — leave that unpainted. dry overnight
Big background areas first — green pipes, then the brick in brown/red-brown. 30 min each
Agrax wash the brick — this is the money move: brown wash runs into the mortar lines and the brickwork instantly looks real. Brick is the one part here that genuinely wants a wash. 30–40 min
Mario — red hat & shirt, blue overalls, skin face, brown hair & moustache. 30 min each
Details — white M-circle, yellow buttons, ? block yellow with a black "?", mushroom caps red with white spots, coins & star gold. 15–20 min each
Eyes — blue iris, black pupil, white of the eye. Sable, take your time — Mario's face is all in the eyes. 15 min/coat
Varnish matt. cure overnight

Just want it done Prime white → block every colour flat → Agrax on the brick only → eyes → varnish. Because it's a flat plaque, not a 3D figure, it's much easier to hold and cut in than it looks.

Make it better The coins and star want real gold metallic — a flat yellow reads fake, a gold paint reads like treasure. It's the single biggest lift on this piece. Gloss the eyes and coins after varnishing for a wet, valuable look.

Kit gap No metallic in a standard Speedpaint starter, so the gold coins/star are where the kit runs out. A £3–4 pot of gold is the fix — worth it, three of your five models use metal.

Yveltal

the drama piece · your centrepiece

Medium+

Red — body, wing insides Black — feather tips, vein streaks Grey — head, upper chest Bone — teeth, claws Blue — the eyes

Prime grey (or grey then a light black in the recesses) — this is the one model where your grey primer is exactly right; you want it moody. dry overnight
Red body — flood Speedpaint red heavy; here the translucency is your friend, it gives real depth in the feathers. This is Speedpaint red at its best. 40 min
Black feather tips — build black up from the very tips inward, thinned, so it fades into the red rather than a hard stop. 20 min/coat
Grey head & chest — light grey, then a light drybrush of near-white on the raised feathers. 20 min
The vein streaks — the black cracks on the red belly are freehand. Practise on paper first, then thin black on the sable, light pressure, from thick to thin. This is the one real skill moment on the whole batch. 15 min
Teeth & claws bone-white, a touch of Agrax at the base for grime. Blue eyes with a white shine dot. 15 min
Base — black, heavy Nuln Oil, then drybrush grey/silver on the rock edges. Very forgiving, adds a lot. 30 min
Nuln Oil into the black feather recesses to deepen, then matt varnish, then gloss just the eyes and claws. cure overnight

Just want it done Prime grey → red body → black wing tips (a clean hard line is fine) → grey head → blue eyes → dark drybrushed base → varnish. Skip the veins and the fade — still a striking model.

Make it better The freehand veins + a softly feathered red→grey chest (stipple the two into each other, or float a thin wash across the join) turn this from good to centrepiece. And glossy eyes — this is the model that benefits most from a spot of gloss varnish.

Kit gap None on colour — your kit covers Yveltal well. The only add-on it truly wants is a dab of gloss on the eyes; matt-only can't give you that alive, wet stare.

Wolverine bust

the boss · realistic face + metal

Hard

Yellow — armour panels Blue — shoulders, sides, gloves Flesh — the face Charcoal — hair & beard Silver — the claws Gold — the nameplate

Prime — white helps the yellow, and the face works fine over it too. dry overnight
Face first, while your hand is fresh — flesh basecoat, then Agrax Earthshade into the scowl, brow and cheek creases (Agrax is a face's best friend — it does the frown for you). Then a lighter flesh dry-touch on the cheekbones, nose and brow ridge. Agrax 30 min · highlights 15 min
Hair & beard — a very dark charcoal, not jet black (pure black reads flat). Nuln into the deepest, then a grey drybrush over the top to catch every hair — drybrushing is forgiving and looks great here. 20 min
Yellow armour — flood the panels; it self-shades the muscle sculpt (abs, pecs, the battle dents). 30–40 min
Blue — shoulders, sides, gloves and forearms. 30 min
Claws — silver metallic, then a Nuln Oil wash over them (metal + Nuln is the classic combo — instant worn steel). 20 min
Eyes — small, white with a brown iris and black pupil; keep them mean, don't over-white them. Sable. 15 min/coat
Base — grey stone drybrushed light; the "Wolverine" letters in gold. Then matt varnish. cure overnight

Just want it done Prime white → flesh face + Agrax → charcoal hair + grey drybrush → yellow & blue suit → claws → mean little eyes → varnish. Skip the layered flesh highlights; the Agrax alone still gives a face with real depth.

Make it better Build the flesh highlights up in two or three lighter steps (cheekbones, nose, brow) and the face reads genuinely alive. Silver + Nuln claws and a gold nameplate lift the whole piece. Edge-highlight the yellow panels with a brighter yellow for that comic sheen.

Kit gap Two things the starter won't have: a silver for the claws and a gold for the nameplate. Honest stand-in with what you own — leave the claws in bare grey primer and hit them with heavy Nuln for a gunmetal look — but a £3 silver is the right answer and makes the claws the star. Save this model for last; a realistic face is the hardest thing here, and you'll be ready for it.

EHow to make them better — the five buys that matter

Your kit gets all five to a proper shelf-standard. If you want to push them, these are the upgrades that do the most for this specific batch, in order of impact. Prices approximate UK — the links would be Amazon searches, not fixed listings, so you can pick the best seller.

Buy	What it fixes	~£
White spray primer	The four bright cartoons come out vivid instead of muted. Biggest single lift, helps 4 of 5. Search: army painter white primer	£11
Gold + silver metallic	Wolverine claws & nameplate, Mario coins & star, Sonic buckle — metal reads pro, yellow reads fake. Search: citadel leadbelcher, retributor gold	£3–4 ea
Opaque white + red	The two colours Speedpaint is weak at — Sonic gloves & shoes, Mario's M & mushroom spots, in one coat not three. Search: white scar, army painter pure red	£3 ea
Gloss varnish (small pot)	Alive, wet eyes on all five, Cyclops's visor, Yveltal's claws — the one thing matt can't do. A brush-on pot lets you spot-gloss just the eyes. Search: army painter gloss varnish or ardcoat	£10
A fine-liner pen (optional)	Clean black cartoon outlines on Sonic, Bart & Mario without a steady brush hand. Search: micron 01 or molotow 1mm	£3

If you buy one thing: the white primer — it improves four of the five for £11. If you buy two: add the gold/silver metallics, since three of your five have metal on them.

FFirst-timer mistakes to dodge

Painting Speedpaint back and forth — flood it and leave it. Brushing a drying coat gives streaks.
Not letting layers dry — smudges and lifting. The times above aren't suggestions.
Spraying too close / too heavy — primer drowns detail, varnish frosts. Far and light, always.
Over-washing the cartoons — Sonic, Bart and Mario want to stay flat and bright. Save the heavy washing for Wolverine's face and Yveltal.
Overloaded brush — wipe the excess off before it touches the model, every single time.

GDrying-times cheat sheet

Stage	Rough dry time (room temp)
Primer spray	30–60 min · overnight ideal
Speedpaint coat	20–40 min
Thin detail coat (white/red)	15–20 min
Wash (Nuln Oil / Agrax)	20–40 min · longer in recesses
Varnish spray	20–30 min/coat · cure overnight

Cold or damp air = add time. When in doubt, wait — patience is about 80% of a clean finish.

Made for Killa's kit · beginner 5-print batch · colours by technique, not fixed pot names — send me a photo of your Speedpaint pots and I'll pin the exact recipe for all five