This is my favorite part of the project and I will show you how to make your planets look great and realistic.
Paints I used:
Yellow, Orange, Blue, Green, White, Black, Grey, Gold (Optional) Red, Brown
Pretty much a basic set of colors is all you need. And any type of acrylic paint will be just fine. cheap paints are quite ok.
In the video I paint the base of the diorama last. But you might want to paint it first so it has time to dry. That way once the planets are finished you can glue them right into the base. So, go ahead and do that. Paint the whole base black and then splash on some white stars.
Paint the Sun a nice bright yellow.
Mercury is simply grey.
Venus is two steps: paint the whole thing white then while that paint is still wet streak in some yellow.
Earth is my favorite one to paint: You do it in several steps:
1. Paint the whole thing a nice light blue color
2. With brown or green add some continents
3. With white add the polar ice caps
4. Finish it off by dabbling in some clouds over the oceans and continents
Mars is a great looking planet. The red is very attractive.
Paint the whole planet mostly red with a little bit of orange swirled in. Then water down some brown and add that in spots to the planet. Once this is done dab on small white polar ice caps both top and bottom (Not shown).
Jupiter is a bit more complicated than the others but it comes out looking great.
Start by painting the whole planet grey:
Then paint two horizontal bands across it. Use red and orange paint. And dab it on. You don't want these bands to be absolutely solid. You want a little bit of grey to show right through.
And finish Jupiter by adding some black, both in streaks on the grey and on the edges of the colored bands.
Saturn is easy to paint. First paint the whole planet yellow then lightly streak on some orange.
Uranus is easy to do. Paint it streaky light blue and white.
Neptune is similar to Uranus but paint it dark blue and white:
Pluto is painted by first covering it all with a very light brown, tan or gold. Then splotching on in patches some watered down grey.
And that's it. Your planets are painted.
Let's finish this diorama by putting it all together (Continue)