Side note question directed at the seasoned painters ...

Army Painter has a flesh toned primer. Given I am slow; this is a warm under tone and would knock out base layer on skin ....

Decent option for a desert themed rebel squad? Should be easy to work up from there to tans, browns and yellows

Since I plan on getting the core set, an AT-ST and one T-47 I'll go something like this:

Day 1: wash, clean moldlines, assemble, prime all the things.

Day 2 - 5: batch work on stormtroopers

Day 6 - 9: batch work on rebel troopers

Day 10 - ???: Vader, Luke, AT-ST, T-47.

If I can find the time and work on it every evening for 2 - 3 hours, like I did last year for my chaos marines , it should be doable.

After that I may start painting the terrain in the box. maybe. XD

22 minutes ago, Dash Two said:

Side note question directed at the seasoned painters ...

Army Painter has a flesh toned primer. Given I am slow; this is a warm under tone and would knock out base layer on skin ....

Decent option for a desert themed rebel squad? Should be easy to work up from there to tans, browns and yellows

I would think it would be faster for the rebel squad's if your worried about being slow to hit them with a primed that is the basetone you want for the uniforms as that's the largest area on them, they don't have a lot of exposed flesh. There was a video that Spikey Bits did that they used Army Painter "Fur Brown" as the base that I thought turned out really nice. If you wanted more of a ROTJ camo look you could use Army Painters "Army Green" or other green.

8 minutes ago, Skyguard said:

I would think it would be faster for the rebel squad's if your worried about being slow to hit them with a primed that is the basetone you want for the uniforms as that's the largest area on them, they don't have a lot of exposed flesh. There was a video that Spikey Bits did that they used Army Painter "Fur Brown" as the base that I thought turned out really nice. If you wanted more of a ROTJ camo look you could use Army Painters "Army Green" or other green.

Agreed.

I have their Desert Yellow. Original plan was that as the primary color. Have a test model done with that primer.

Now, may change mind and with that deciding on tackling the hardest area via primer ... the face ... and using a color easily pushed up. 2 bird thing.

i struggle mightily on the faces

I found working with yellow was not impossible for highlighting purposes

Not the easiest color to move up to any non brownish hue in my limited experience

Day 1: assemble 21 stormtroopers and 4 scout troopers. Pretend I'm going to prime them, but actually stare at my AT-ST, and eventually push the troopers aside so I can build my toy. It will all be a blur after that.

3 hours ago, Dash Two said:

I struggle mightily on the faces.

Usually we take the paint and poke out brush into this and then apply that to our model. When you do this you have the paint beading on the outside of the brush, which causes problems. Now if you are doing big area's of paint or don't mind some slips and such, this is OK.

However, if you want some control of the paint, then between poking the brush into the paint and slapping it on, pull the brush across a sheet of paper and rotate the brush. You want to reform the tip and remove any paint from the outside edges of the bristles. Now with suitably watered down paint you should find that the paint flows out the tip of the brush almost like a fountain pen. Practice signing your name and applying varying degrees of pressure on the brush while you are there. I had been painting for years with the poke and paint, and when I was taught this I improved a lot.

I also recommend that you use a size 1-2 for most of these models and only go down to a zero when doing fine details. If you are painting eyes, maybe go for a 00-000. The thing is the smaller brushes don't hold a tip any better, they just hold less paint and if you are using the poke and paint method have less "sides". They also dry out faster so require more cleaning.

As painting a face try:

• Basecoat in a dark flesh
• Shade with Agrax Earthshade - Dab this on and with a spare brush remove the was that goes where you don't want it.
• Highlight with a normal flesh colour and apply in a "T" to the forehead and nose and a "U" to the cheeks and chin. With a damp second brush feather the edges, leaving the lighter colours near the eyes, on the nose, cheek tops and chin bottom.
• Highlight again with a little white and apply to the areas that the light would hit, on the forehead, nose, cheeks and chin. Keep repeating to smaller areas and make the shade lighter each time.
• If you get hard lines you can add some paint to a lot of water and just dry off the brush so that as you apply the paint it just goes on in a thin layer, being thin it should blend the layers together somewhat.

Don't bother with the eyes, if you must paint the eyes in a colour, then add a little triangle of white to the tear duct and other side of the eye. Most of us will need a mental health professional if we try this.

Mind you if you try this put a towel against the edge of your table, and either push your lower arm on the table edge or rest your elbows on the table. Don't use your wrists, you have a pulse there and your hands will move like crazy.

@Amanal Thank you. I have been doing ... think this is right order ... Bugman's Glow; Reikland Fleshshade; Cadian and Kislev Flesh Tones (cannot remember which of those 2 goes first)

My understanding of under painting is getting better. I think where I have failed is putting down a solid coat post shade. Meaning covering or I think it is called "blocking" in the entire area (face or otherwise) minus the edges and letting the undercoat do some work.

I am going to try what you suggested, which is darker flesh color to start. Shade lightly. Then, bring it up from there.

Something you may have to experiment with is the tones you use in each layer, on a face I would try and build up to a white, sometimes you don't want subtle either but some rather harsh layers.

Keep in mind that unless your opponent gets in 4" away from you model what he'll see and you too for that matter is what is 2-3' away at most times.

I intend to paint before I base so the bases are clean. So it is lots of lots of stormtroopers and vader to get the base units done. The speeder bikes and the AT-ST. It's gonna be a while before I can play rebels.

I don't know if it will be day one, but I think to involve the family I might split up one unit of rebel troopers between my wife and kids. Do your think your immersion will be too interrupted if you opponent looks like it was painted by a 5 year old?