How to Drybrush Miniatures: Fast Texture on Fur, Stone and Rust

Drybrushing is wiping almost all the paint off a stiff brush and sweeping it across a model so the remaining pigment catches only the raised texture. It is the fastest highlighting technique there is, and on the right surface it produces in ten seconds what layering would take twenty minutes to do worse.

This guide covers the brush and the wiping step that everything depends on, which surfaces drybrushing suits, how to avoid the chalky mess that gives the technique its bad reputation, and how to fix one.

What does drybrushing do?

Paint on a nearly dry brush cannot flow. It transfers only where the bristles physically strike something, which on a miniature means the raised edges and the high points of any texture — the tips of fur, the top of a stone, the ridges of chainmail, the rim of a rivet.

So instead of you deciding where the highlights go, the sculpt decides. That is a huge advantage on complex texture and a real disadvantage on smooth plate, where there is nothing to catch and the brush just deposits a grey haze.

What brush should you use?

Not a good one. Drybrushing splays bristles and wears them out, so it is the job for retired brushes and for cheap stiff ones bought specifically.

What matters:

• Stiff bristles. Synthetic is better than sable here. A soft brush bends instead of striking.
• A flat or round head with a blunt end, not a fine point. Purpose-made drybrushes have short, dense, flat heads.
• Size to the job. A big brush for a cloak or a tank hull, a small one for a face or a gun barrel.

Keep drybrushes separate from your good brushes, and never use a brush you care about.

How do you drybrush, step by step?

The wiping step is the technique. Everything else is trivial.

1. Pick a colour lighter than the surface — usually the basecoat lightened, or a purpose-made dry-range paint, which is formulated thick and matte for exactly this.
2. Do not thin it. Drybrushing wants thick paint. Water is the enemy here.
3. Dip only the very end of the bristles.
4. Wipe it off on a paper towel. Keep wiping. Wipe until you think there is no paint left, then wipe some more. When a stroke on the towel leaves only a faint ghost, you are ready.
5. Sweep across the surface with light, quick strokes, moving in the direction the texture runs — down the length of fur, across the top of stone.
6. Build up gradually. Several light passes give a controllable result; one loaded pass gives chalk.
7. Stop earlier than you want to. Drybrushing always looks stronger once the model is under normal light.

Which surfaces suit drybrushing?

Excellent on:

• Fur and hair — exactly what the technique is for.
• Stone, rubble and rock on bases.
• Chainmail and scale, where every link needs a highlight.
• Rust and corroded metal, over a rough dark base.
• Wood grain, rope, wicker, thatch.
• Tyranid and Ork textures — hide, chitin ridges, scrap armour.

Poor on:

• Smooth armour plate. There is nothing for the bristles to catch, so you get a dusty film. Use edge highlighting instead.
• Faces. Far too coarse; drybrushing a face makes it look dirty rather than lit.
• Clean, bright schemes, where the matte chalky texture fights the finish.
• Large vehicle panels, for the same reason as armour plate — though drybrushing the rivets and edges of a hull is fine.

How do you avoid the chalky look?

Chalkiness is the technique's failure mode and it has three causes.

• Too much paint left on the brush. Wipe more. This is nine times out of ten the answer.
• Too big a colour jump. Drybrushing a near-white over a dark basecoat leaves visible pale dust. Build up through an intermediate tone.
• Too many passes over the same spot. Pigment accumulates on the flat surfaces as well as the edges and the whole area goes lighter and flatter.

If a drybrush has gone chalky, the repair is a thin wash or glaze in the original colour over the top. It re-tints the dust, knocks back the contrast and unifies the surface. This wash-over-drybrush combination is worth knowing as a deliberate technique in its own right, not just a repair.

Drybrushing across an army

• Ork armour and skin: drybrush the scrap metal with a steel tone, then a rust drybrush, and most of the model is done.
• Necrons: a silver drybrush over a heavily black-washed body catches every ridge of the metal skeleton in one pass.
• Tyranids: drybrush the chitin ridges a bone tone, leaving the recesses dark.
• Space Wolves and Space Marine fur, pelts and cloaks: the classic use — a couple of lightening drybrushes down the length of the fur.
• Every base in the army: drybrush the texture with a light stone tone. This alone makes bases stop looking like brown paste.
• Vehicles: drybrush the tracks, exhausts and rivet lines; leave the hull plates to edge highlighting.

Drybrushing is also the step that makes batch painting genuinely fast: one brush, no thinning, no palette, ten models in a few minutes.

Paints to use

Dry-range paints are thick and matte, formulated for this technique; a normal paint used unthinned works too.

Longbeard Grey · Citadel Colour Dry

Terminatus Stone · Citadel Colour Dry

Ryza Rust · Citadel Colour Dry

Administratum Grey · Citadel Colour Layer

What are the most common drybrushing mistakes?

• Not wiping enough paint off. The single cause of most bad drybrushing.
• Thinning the paint. Thinned paint flows into recesses and defeats the entire point.
• Using a soft, good-quality brush. It bends rather than striking the texture, and you ruin a brush you liked.
• Drybrushing smooth armour. Produces haze, not highlights.
• Going too light too fast. Build up through intermediate tones.
• Drybrushing after you have finished everything else. Loose pigment settles on surrounding areas — do it before the fine detail work, or be ready to tidy up.

Frequently asked questions

What is the difference between drybrushing and stippling?

Drybrushing sweeps a nearly dry brush across raised texture. Stippling dabs the brush end-on, leaving a speckled pattern — better for rust, damage and rough concrete than for highlighting.

Can I drybrush over a wash?

Yes, and it is the standard order: basecoat, wash, drybrush. The wash darkens the recesses, the drybrush lightens the peaks, and you get contrast from both directions in two fast steps.

Does drybrushing ruin brushes?

It wears them out, yes — the bristles splay permanently. Use old or cheap brushes and keep them separate.

Should I drybrush before or after edge highlighting?

Before, if you are doing both. Drybrushing throws loose pigment about; edge highlighting is precise and should come last.

Is drybrushing a beginner technique?

It is easy to learn and used at every level — professional painters drybrush fur, stone and rust routinely. What marks out a beginner is drybrushing everything, including surfaces that need a brush line instead.

How do I fix a model I have drybrushed too heavily?

Glaze or wash over it in the original basecoat colour. That tints the excess pigment back down and unifies the surface.

What comes next

Metal is the one material with its own rules — metallic paint behaves differently from everything else. Next: painting metallics and non-metallic metal.