How to Drybrush Miniatures (It's Not Just for Plebs)

Hey again, friends. Let's talk about drybrushing. I'll be honest with you. For the longest time, I looked at drybrushing the same way most painters do. It's that thing you learn on day one, slap some dusty highlights on a Space Marine's kneecaps, and then move on to "real" techniques. It's for terrain. It's for speed painting. It's for people who don't care about quality. Right?

Wrong. Very wrong. I was so wrong about this that I painted an entire model using nothing but dry brushes just to prove a point. And you know what? I was kind of impressed. Actually, more than kind of. The whole thing took about two hours start to finish, and I came away thinking about all the ways I could push this technique further. So let me walk you through everything I learned, because I'm pretty confident you can do this too.

What You'll Need

Before we get into the actual drybrushing tutorial, let's talk tools. You don't need a ton of stuff, but the right brush makes a genuine difference here.

• A proper dry brush set. I use the Artis Opus Series D set (they even made a NINJON Slay the Gray edition, which is very cool of them). The firm, bowl-shaped bristles are specifically designed for this. But if you're just getting started, any stiff-bristled brush will work. That old ratty brush you retired from regular painting? It can do the job. Just know that a purpose-built drybrush will give you noticeably more control.
• A texture palette or hard non-porous surface. Chipboard, a ceramic tile, an old CD case. You need something to work paint into the bristles. The Artis Opus Texture Palette is what I use. More on why this matters in a minute.
• A small piece of sponge. For dampening your brush. This is more important than you think.
• Your paints. Whatever you normally use. I was working with Rhinox Hide, various browns and metals, black, and white for this particular model.
• A primed miniature. Black primer works great for drybrushing because those deep recesses stay dark naturally.

The Biggest Mistake Everyone Makes: It's Not Actually "Dry"

Here's the thing that gives drybrushing a bad name, and it's right there in the name itself. "Dry" brushing. People hear "dry" and think they need to remove every last bit of moisture from the brush before touching the model. And then they wonder why everything looks chalky and grainy.

Think about it this way. If you remove all the moisture and medium from your brush and paint, all you're left with is dry, chalky pigment. That's physics. That's not a technique problem. That's a "you stripped out the thing that makes paint behave like paint" problem.

So here's the actual process for controlling moisture on your drybrush:

1. Dampen your brush on a small sponge first. Not soaking wet. Just enough that if you touch the bristles to the back of your hand, they feel cool. That's the moisture level you're going for.
2. Load a small amount of paint onto the brush.
3. Work the paint into the bristles on a hard, non-porous surface. This is where your texture palette or chipboard comes in. You're distributing the paint evenly across the bristles and removing the excess.
4. Test on the back of your hand. You should see a faint, even deposit of color. Not a thick smear. Not nothing. A whisper of color.

And here's the critical bit that I wish someone had told me years ago. Do NOT use a paper towel to wipe off excess paint. Every time you see somebody wiping their dry brush on a paper towel, they're sucking the moisture right out of the bristles. That's what leads to the chalky, dusty results that give drybrushing its bad reputation.

Three Techniques, One Tool: Smudging, Drybrushing, and Stippling

Here's something that surprised me. A dry brush isn't just for "drybrushing." The tool can do three distinct things, and understanding when to use each one is what separates a quick-and-dirty highlight job from something that actually looks great.

Smudging

This is how I start. Smudging means making tight concentric circles with the brush so paint gets applied to the model from all angles at once. It creates a smooth, universal basecoat that builds up gradually.

I used this to put a base of Rhinox Hide across my entire Death Guard model. By smudging over black primer, I got a nice deep brown that kept the darkest recesses fully black. Beautiful darkest-darks without any extra effort.

Standard Drybrushing

This is the one you already know. Light, quick strokes across raised surfaces to catch the edges and textures. The brush skips across the high points and leaves the recesses alone. Classic highlighting technique.

The thing I learned is that you want to build this up in layers, not try to nail it in one pass. That "one quick hard pass" approach is exactly why so many people think drybrushing looks bad. It's like trying to paint a wall with one thick coat instead of two thin ones. Use your dry brushes the same way you use your standard brushes: gradually, with multiple light layers.

Stippling

This was the real revelation for me. Stippling is gently jabbing the tip of your brush straight down onto the surface to create a series of tiny, irregular dots. It's perfect for building up smooth transitions, adding texture, and working color into specific areas without the streaky look you can get from standard drybrushing.

A firm, bowl-shaped drybrush does this beautifully because the bristles support themselves at any angle. If you try stippling with a floppy old brush, the bristles deflect sideways when they hit the model and you get streaks instead of dots. I learned this the hard way. Trust me on this one.

Brush Selection Actually Matters (More Than I Thought)

I'll be real with you. Halfway through painting my model, I got uncomfortable. I wasn't experienced enough with stippling using a large dry brush, so I swapped over to a tiny old ratty brush that I normally use for detail drybrushing.

This was a mistake. I did it way too soon.

That little brush didn't actually offer me any more control at that stage. Its floppy bristles worked against me more than they helped. A firm-bristled, bowl-shaped brush is designed to support itself no matter what angle you approach from. When the brush isn't firm, it gives way while you're making a stroke, which means less control and more pressure required just to get paint off the bristles.

The general rule: use a bigger brush than you think you need for longer than you think you should. You can have a surprising amount of control with a large drybrush, and it produces a smoother overall result. Save the tiny brushes for genuinely tiny details, like adding a few dots of pure white for metallic glints.

Painting a Full Model with Only Dry Brushes

Let me walk you through how this actually played out on my Death Guard Plague Marine, because it covers most of the drybrushing techniques you'll ever need.

Building the Base

Starting from a black primer, I smudged Rhinox Hide across the whole model in concentric circles. This gave me a deep brown foundation with naturally dark recesses. No extra shadow work needed. The key here is multiple light passes. Build it up gradually.

Adding Color and Highlights

From there, I started building up lighter colors on the surfaces that would catch more light. And this is important: from the very start, I was keeping my light source in mind. Drybrushing isn't just "hit all the edges." You're still thinking about where light falls on the model. That intentionality, being purposeful about where and how you place the paint, is what separates drybrushing that looks considered from drybrushing that looks lazy.

I got to admit, I was pretty impressed with how the drybrush could achieve what I was going for. Building up depth of color gradually, even on small details, worked way better than I expected. And it took maybe a quarter of the time my standard layering technique would have taken.

Rusty Metals and Texture

For the metals, I wanted high contrast. Some areas kept that pure Rhinox Hide showing through, with big jumps to brighter colors and small dots and splotches. Then I stippled pure black paint in random spots to represent deep shadows and the starting points for metallic glints.

One mistake here: I should have used a bigger standard dry brush for the black stippling, not a floppy little brush. The spots came out too big and not as irregular as I wanted. Lesson learned for next time.

Then I came back with a few dots of pure white to represent glints of metal shining through cracked rust. This is actually one of the few cases where a tiny old brush was the right tool. Just a few precise dots. That's all you need.

Lenses and Small Details

Here's where I thought drybrushing would fall apart completely. How do you paint lenses without glazes? There's no way this works. Right?

It works. When I kept the brush slightly damp and used focused, gentle stippling motions over the top and bottom rims of the lenses, the color naturally faded and created a surprisingly realistic transition. Tiny transparent dots built up over several layers. It works almost identically to how glazing builds up color. Then one small dot of white in the top right corner of each lens sells the whole effect as a reflective surface.

Going Dark, Not Just Light

We usually think of drybrushing as building up lighter and lighter colors. Highlights, highlights, highlights. But when I tried going darker on the horns for both the Plague Marine and the Nurgling, the transition came out smooth. Just as smooth as building up with brighter colors. That got me wondering about all sorts of possibilities. Going darker selectively, then building back up again. There's a lot more depth to this technique than the hobby community gives it credit for.

The Two Things I'd Fix Next Time

When I look back at the areas of the model that I'm not happy with, it came down to two main things:

1. Moisture control. I didn't re-dampen my brush often enough. In the areas where I kept the moisture right, the results were noticeably smoother. In the areas where I let the brush dry out, things got chalky. It's that simple. Check the back of your hand. If the bristles don't feel cool, hit that sponge again.
2. Paint load control. I made the classic rookie mistake of not wiping off the correct amount of paint before going to the model and not testing on my hand first. Some areas came out well. Others were too heavy-handed. Test. Every. Time.

These aren't complicated problems. They're just discipline. And honestly, the fact that these were my main issues after painting a full model tells you something about how forgiving drybrushing actually is as a technique.

Why Drybrushing Deserves More Respect

Let me put it this way. David Soper, one of the greatest miniature painters alive, built up an entire arm using drybrushing as the base and initial color layout. Obviously he did incredible work on top of that foundation, but that's my point. If it's good enough for display-level painting as a starting point, it's absolutely good enough for your army, your kill team, your D&D warband, or whatever you're working on.

Two things really stuck with me after this whole process. First, I was able to see results much quicker than I usually do when painting layer by layer. That's genuinely motivating. You're not staring at an ugly half-finished model for hours wondering when it'll start to look good. Second, I was learning. Figuring things out. Thinking about how to do it better next time. And because the whole model only took about two hours, the cost of experimenting felt low. That ability to experiment without it feeling like a big commitment is huge.

Quick Reference: Drybrushing Dos and Don'ts

Do

• Dampen your brush on a sponge before loading paint
• Work paint into the bristles on a hard, non-porous surface
• Test on the back of your hand before touching the model
• Build up gradually with multiple light passes
• Use a bigger brush than you think you need
• Think about your light source and be intentional with placement
• Re-dampen regularly throughout the session

Don't

• Wipe excess paint on a paper towel (it sucks the moisture out)
• Try to get full coverage in one heavy pass
• Switch to a tiny brush too early
• Use a floppy-bristled brush for stippling
• Forget to re-dampen (when things go chalky, this is almost always why)

Drybrushing Tools I Recommend

You can absolutely get started with whatever stiff-bristled brush you have lying around. I've used old ratty brushes, cheap craft store brushes, all sorts of things. But if you want to invest in proper drybrushing tools, here's what I use and why:

• Artis Opus Series D Dry Brush Set (NINJON Edition) - These are purpose-built for miniature drybrushing. Firm, bowl-shaped bristles that hold their shape at any angle. The set gives you a range of sizes from detail work to broad coverage. The NINJON Slay the Gray edition includes the extra-large brush (which Byron from Artis Opus says is his personal favorite) plus some extra goodies. I'm biased, obviously, since my name is on the case. But I genuinely think having the right tool makes a noticeable difference with this technique.
• Artis Opus Texture Palette - A hard, textured surface designed specifically for working paint into drybrush bristles. It distributes paint evenly and helps you control how much ends up on the brush. You can substitute a ceramic tile or chipboard, but I like having a dedicated surface. Less mess, more consistent results.

Where to Go from Here

If you're new to drybrushing, grab any miniature and just try it. Seriously. Prime it black, pick two or three colors, and spend an hour playing with smudging, drybrushing, and stippling. Don't worry about it being perfect. The whole point is that this technique is fast and forgiving, so you can experiment without it feeling like a big deal.

If you've been drybrushing for a while but thought it was "just for basecoating terrain," challenge yourself to paint a full model with nothing but dry brushes. You'll be surprised at what you can pull off. And at two hours for a complete model, there's not much to lose.

Even if you never go full drybrush-only, adding more stippling and controlled drybrushing into your regular painting workflow will speed things up and give you textures and transitions that are hard to achieve any other way.

Now get out there and slay the gray.

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