Friday, July 11, 2008

The Workbench - Army Painter

Hey all.

In anticipation of my next project, an army of 25mm Napoleonic Austrians, I decided to buy and test out a jar of Army Painter Quick Shade. This stuff is basically a can of stain that you dip your figures into (otherwise known as... a dip!) I got the Light Shade, as my Austrians will be largely in white.

I have a very large Warhammer Fantasty Middenheim army, which is a perfect test base because of how much white there is on the figures; I am undercoating an Austrian today to see how he turns out, but for now, here is how my old Empire guys look.

The basic paintjob is on the left. It is SUPER super basic; one color on most spots, a quick highlight on the blue, and that is it. Rather crappy, really.

The next two are after being dipped; the middle guy got shaken off five or so times, the rightmost guy got shaken off 2 times. I wanted to see how the look would change if I left them with a little bit more stain on them.

I think they turned out very nice; I am excited to paint up an Austrian army. In the meantime I'll take care of my Empire army, and then sell it off. If anyone is interested, let me know!


4 comments:

John said...

The main figure looks good. I'd stick with a whole lotta shakin' for removing excess. I've seen some pretty bad dip jobs because the excess was not removed enough or because the person chose a shade that was too dark. Your figures look very nice, especially the one in the middle. not too much difference between 2 shakes and 5 shakes except for the base.

Can you do another demo with a figure that has more of an exposed face? It would be interesting to see how AP brings out the facial features.

Cheers!

John

Author said...

Howdy!

Yeah, so far so good; I actually JUST posted an Austrian that I did above; I can't get a great photo, and to be honest the light shade does not seem to be that dark. I think I might, when doing this for real, do a quick highlight on the faces with a light color before I dip the whole thing:)

Anyway... talk about timing! Hope you see the guy above, and I'll try to get some face-specific photos for you:)

Author said...

Okay John, I put up a closeup of the Hungarian soldier above; I hope that answers your question? He definately benefited from a highlight across the T of the face (eyebrows, nose, chin) and I could have even given a touch on the cheeks, but overall he looks good.

PS I do the eyes lastl otherwise it looks funny.

Michael said...

That is a good example of how it looks, I have been toying with it but had yet to see the value.
Now I do.

Good stuff.