Ork Battlewagon Part One

August tends to be a little hectic here in the higher education business so we are behind on the once a week post pace but not too far.  Today I will looking at an Ork Battle wagon I'm painting.  I like to do vehicles first in an army to serve as inspiration as well as a guide to theme and color.  For this battle wagon I'll be trying some army painter quickshade and using the airbrush.

So like many projects that take on a life of their own so did this battle wagon.  First I base coated the model in Vallejo Heavy Goldbrown the equivalent of GW foundation Iyanden Darksun.  I featured this in my first blog on Bad Moon Orks

I started with black as the undercoat because I like the shadow effect leaving some of the black for shadow the heavy goldbrown is a good  midtone to make the jump to a brighter yellow.  I don't favor a white undercoat because then the yellow and the model will just be too bright.  In addition when you airbrush coverage is not an issue

Initially I airbrushed the wagon with Golden Diarylide Yellow but after I was done I felt the wagon had too much of an orange tone and the subsequent quickshade would darken the model further and would be too far off yellow.  You can see the wonderful coverage with the airbrush.

So not being satisfied I decided to go a shade higher and use Golden Hansa Yellow Medium.  I don't like airbrushing a second coat on top of another as it can get sloppy but the airbrush is a precise instrument with a lot of control so you can do a good second coat.

The results were fairly good on close up near some of the bolts you can see some buildup where the paint has pooled but that can easily be shaded.

Here is a larger shot of the model after the second airbrush coat.  You can see pooling near the bolts here as well but once again not bad at all.

I then tried the quickshade from army painter you can see the results here this is the soft tone

Army painter quickshade does work as advertised.  You can see some wonderful shading here and it collected in the areas where there was some pooling in the airbrush coat and this subsequently created a good shading effect.  I felt this was a little light so for the rest of the wagon I went with quickshade strongtone.  I wanted more of a dirty look to the vehicle.  I preffer to use highlights to pick out the yellow color as opposed to a strong overall yellow coat.

The vehicle is not yet completed but you can see here the result of the strongtone.

The top picture shows where the wagon is currently.  I have coated some parts in black and started to add some paint chip areas where the metal would show.  The quickshade gave some good shading and also added an overall grime look I wanted.

The results are good with army painter quickshade but their are some concerns.  One this is a varnish most of the material I work with will clean up with water you need mineral spirits to clean up quickshade.  Quickshade when it dries is a high gloss.  I don't like the idea of painting all the parts and then shading the model and varnishing.  I need to see the shade to decide on highlights and other features.  Now army painter has their own matte varnish they say can be sprayed on and painted on top of.  I used this spray varnish and got frosting on my model.  Not severe it was in select spots but this was the first time I ever had frosting and it was not a welcomed sight.  I was able to cover it up fortunately, but this was a big scare.  I used a fleshtone wash and got pretty close to the same results.  I will take some pictures of that for a future entry.

This project is ongoing and is a good example of how things can sometimes go astray when your painting but if your patient and take your time you can turn most situations around.  I expect to be toiling away on this model for a little while and when it's done you will see the final results.  Thanks for reading and happy painting.

Decal Details

Well it has been a little longer then I would like with a post.  Currently I am wrestling with an Ork Battle wagon trying to get the Bad Moon yellow I want.  However that isn't the topic today.  I hope to be done with the truck in a few days so I can post about it and catch up with my one post a week pace.  What I am covering today are some handy tools to use with decals.  I have seen a great post covering those items at Pit of the Oni.  Since I recently put these products to the test I thought it might be useful to post a review here.

We are talking about four products for finishing models created by Microscale Industries.  They have a number of products in their line the four I mention here best fit the typical needs of miniature hobbyist.  The majority of these products work with decals.  And these products works as advertised

Liquid decal film is is intended to restore old decals.  It can also be used to create custom decals.  I'm not sure about the custom decal process what I can comment on is the restoration.  In my situation I had some great Forgeworld Tau decals from about five years ago.  I was pretty sure they were finished.  I used a small brush applied the decal film and let the decal dry for 20 minutes.  I then wet the decal like I would if it was brand new.  The decal came off without a problem and slid right into place.

Now the area where I wanted to apply the decal was a circular surface at the back of a crisis suit.  I was concerned the decal may not be as flexible as I needed to work it into the spot in question.  That's where Micro sol comes in handy.  First you apply some Micro Sol to the location on the model then place the decal.  Lastly apply Micro Sol to the decal when it is placed.  The decal will sort of slip into place.  Micro Sol softens the decal dramatically so you want to be careful in application as it can move and get distorted.

Micro Set existentially does the same as Micro Sol.  Micro Sol would be the maximum strength and Micro Set regular strength.  It is applied in the same way and strengthens adhesion as well as making a decal softer.  I would use Micro Set on decals in typical situations and Micro Sol on sections of a model that from a glance look like they would be a challenge to apply correctly.

Micro Flat is basically a clear flat coat you can apply to surfaces.  Its best use is on decals.  It flattens the glossy finish of a decal without distorting the color and finish of the decal.  Micro Flat can also be used to try and soften the frosting effect you can sometimes get from some finishing varnishes.  It won't totally remove the frosting effect it does improve it and depending on how frosted a model is it can salvage a mini.  I don't have pictures on this but the blog I cite earlier Pit of Oni does have pictures to show this effect if you search his keywords section.

Above you can see the decal applied to my model.  I used Micro Sol, Liquid Decal Film and Micro Flat on the above mini.  I don't think the picture does justice to how well these products work.  The decal looks perfectly blended and has a wonderful flat finish.  I have not seen these products at my local gaming store I have seen them however at a traditional hobby store that does military models.  You can also find Microscale products online at Armorcast.  Till next time happy painting

Adventures in Priming

A little more time has passed since my last entry then I would have liked.  But that's life.  I was sidetracked on some computer issues reinstalling software and enjoying some PC gaming.  Today I have two things to share.  First and foremost I want to talk about my experiences with P3 primer.  I have heard many good things about the P3 line of paints.  In particular people seem to like their primer.  I used the P3 black primer to prime up my 500/750 pt Ork list I mentioned in my last entry.

I paint my Orks in a Bad Moon's color scheme.  However unlike many people who prime them white I still prefer to prime black.  I simply don't like the high pitched yellow some people favor.  They're Orks they are dirty so there is no way yellow would stay clean with them it would be dingy and dirty and that's the color scheme I go for.  As I work up my exact recipe for painting this batch of Orks I will share that with you all.  Also for this project I have purchased the dips produced by army painter.  I won't be using all the shades I will probably experiment to see what works best but I thought the dips might add a nice overall wash to the Orks.  In particular I think it will be great on the vehicles.  Note I have no plans to fully dip these miniatures.  That method in my mind wastes a lot of the fluid and is just too imprecise for me.  I plan to use a crappy brush to put it on and remove excess and see what works.

What I want to highlight today is the priming.  I used P3 and had some interesting results.  The primer when I sprayed it came out in an odd sort of flat cone burst.  It was narrow and wide.  That threw me off as I'm used to a more circular cone like spray.  The product actually went on pretty well however given how many things I was spraying which was around 50 miniatures from figures to terrain to vehicles I had to move the can a lot to get the coverage I wanted.  The coverage on vehicles was great.  On the actual minis I didn't always get the coverage I was looking for.  If I just sprayed the minis themselves I probably would have gotten what I needed.  I had no instances of a fuzziness, I'm not talking about a warm feeling but the primer build up that happens on a mini when you spray too much primer.  This primer goes on very smooth in a sense it has a sort of liquid feel to it.  I got some residue on the floor I hadn't seen before and that's how I would describe it like a light liquid.  I am looking forward to experimenting a bit more with this primer.  However I will say the GW Black primer has always been good so I don't really have need t replace it.  What I really need to see is the P3 White primer.  It is almost a scientific law at this point that the GW White primer is horrible.  I will post additional results as I see them.

Now to address an issue I highlighted earlier.  I did not get the coverage on my Ork minis I was looking for.  When I start on a miniature I like to have a solid primed coat to start on.  I like a uniform black coat as my base.  Usually when you spray primer you always end up with some patches of gray or metal underneath.  Primer doesn't typical cover that thoroughly.  If you try to be that thorough you end up with too much primer.  What I used to do was take my minis on the side and hit them with a sloppy coat of thin black before I started painting my primary colors.  However what I do these days is airbrush on a black coat.  What that does is give me a very smooth coat to work on.  The airbrush gives me excellent control over the paint so I get a coat that covers without obscuring the details.  An airbrush is capable of much more but this is definitely one of the simpler uses.  The GW spray gun would do the same however that tool is very limited beyond that application.  I choose to invest in an airbrush because I wanted the tool to grow with me as I experimented.  In a future entry I'll do a crash course on the airbrush and what it can do.  Below you can see the results in the case of the statues the right one is airbrushed the left is only the primed coat.

To work out my Bad Moon recipe I am painting the battle wagon first.  I will post updates so you can see the project move forward.  To lay a base for the yellow coat I used Vallejo Heavy Goldbrown the equivalent of GW foundation Iyanden Darksun.  I could mix this up for the airbrush but I prefer to brush it on.  It gives me time to work with the model and I still find it relaxing to brush.

PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT
When you work with a color like Heavy Goldbrown make sure you clean your hands well after your done.  I ran out after a mid day painting session just splashing my hands.  While I was out I went to the bathroom came back and looked down at my hand.  Some of that goldbrown got on one of my nails.  At the moment I saw that I didn't realize it was paint I thought it was something else.  It made for an awkward social moment.  With that till next time.