Re: [GZG] Painting Guide for Starships

I can't advise from personal experience because I've never been a 
good painter myself ("acceptable wargame standard", that's me!), but 
from the ones that I've seen done by other folks I'd say the best 
technique is basecoat, then a wash, then pick out as many individual 
panels and details as you have the time/patience for, some with the 
base colour and some with a lighter shade of it. The wash gives 
darker areas between the highlighted panels, bringing them into sharp 
relief, but doesn't give the ship too much of an overall "grimy" look 
like an overall topcoat wash can do. If you want to drybrush, do it 
VERY sparingly just to bring up the edges of panels.

Best,

Jon (GZG)

>PoorPainting-R-I, as I was very satisfied with the simple dark green,
>EE(tm), base coat with simple hand painted insignia for my ESU. Went
for
>the WWII CCCP tank look...
>
>However, a friend had fair luck with basing black, heavy drybrushing
dark
>gray, and light drybrushing light gray, though I thought it looked a
BIT
>chalky after the last, for his NSL. He had some waterslide iron crosses
>that worked well.
>
>My one pride-of-ship-painting goes back to old Superior Terran ships.
>Simple diagonal stripes mid-ship worked VERY well with the flying
wedges.
>Prolly work, as well, for FSE. I liked a very light color for a base
coat,
>and then same side of cool/warm color divide. I had almost sky blue
base,
>then dark blue and purple/maroon for the stripes.
>
>Wish I'd known about washes, back then...
>
>Something to think about until a real painter replies. ;->=
>
>I do think you may need to thin any wash you may do; my limited
observation
>is that, for something like spaceships, it should be almost invisible
until
>dry, and then, very subtle. Unless, of course, you are going for the
gothic
>space look.
>
>The_Beast
>
>Mike Hudak wrote on 12/04/2007 09:16:28 AM:
>
>>  Hi Guys,
>>
>>  Talked to wife, and should be getting some GZG ships for Christmas. 
I
>>  just need some tips as to how to paint them.  My last attempt didn't
>>  work out that well.
>>
>>  I want to stick with a base color for each main power (ESU, NAC,
NSL,
>>  FSE) which went well enough.  But tried to apply a black ink wash
which
>>  didn't work out as well.
>>
>>  I'll end up reapplying a base coat to the older ones, and apply
primer
>>  and a base coat to the newer ones.	I still plan on trying to do a
wash
>>  on them to add some shadow.  But other than that, I'm looking for
ideas.
>>  Something simple that I can apply uniformly across a main power.
>>  Nothing too elaborate, but something that will look nice on a
tabletop
>>  that won't take hours per ship to paint.  (Hours being relative... 
I
>>  know some of you can work minor miracles on figures in 15 minutes. 
I
>>  don't have that level of skill......)
>>
>>  So I'm looking for ideas, hints and tips.  Pictures of other craft
>>  and/or painting guides would be appreciated.  Even if it's just how
to
>>  better apply a wash.  (I have the recipe for 'magic wash' from the
list,
>>  but I think I went bad by adding too much ink to it.)
>>
>>  I know this is a vague request.  I'm not even sure myself what I'm
>>  looking for.  So for now, I'm just looking....
>
>
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