Hi everyone,

My nine year-old daughter and I fell in love with the X-Wing miniature game a few months ago.

I've had an amazing time gaming with her, and I became so inspired by the amazing repaints that I've seen in this and other forums that I decided to try to learn how to repaint my own ships. I'm a middle-aged guy, and I hadn't picked up a paintbrush since 2005 or so. I wasn't exactly an amazing painter back then, and my middle-aged eyesight and trembling hands aren't helping things! That said, I'm really proud to show off my beginning efforts. I'm really trying to focus on improving my brush control, using thinner paints in more layers, and learning to highlight my ships. Progress is slow, but I'm seeing improvement with every ship I paint.

First, here's a picture of the custom X-Wing table that my daughter and I painted together. It's a 4x6 sheet of wood that we painted with a deep black/grey chalkboard finish. It's a great surface for playing on: It has just a little bit of grip to help avoid accidental bumps and unintentional ship movement, but it's still smooth enough for easy ship movement. We painted a 3x3' fight area, and use the rest of the board for token stores, our cards, etc.

My daughter and I fly ships we think are cool regardless of whether they're "good" or not, and so our squadrons are atypical and weird.

My daughter's first request was for me to repaint an imperial squadron of her favorite ships: the TIE interceptor, TIE defender, and TIE phantom. She gave me the squadron's name ("Viper Squadron") and asked for a green paint job. I obliged.

This has been a really tough squadron for her to fly effectively, but my daughter loves these ships to death and is reluctant to fly "easier" squadrons.

TIE Phantom

TIE Defender

TIE Interceptor

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I took on the HWK-290 next, not because I'm especially fond of the ship, but because I greatly disliked the stock paintjob and wanted to practice with a lighter color palette.

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I'm working on a Firespray-31 "Marauder" repaint. It's such a fun paint job, and I love the idea of a Kath Scarlet's Binayre Pirates squadron. I'm still trying to design that list, but here's the latest WIP shot of my Firespray-31. There are a lot of issues with my paintjob, but it looks good on the table. I have two more Firespray-31 models on order: I'm going to attempt to redo the Kath Scarlet paintjob again with the lessons I've learned, and I have another colorful bounty hunter colorscheme I'm dying to try. Any tips on how to get a nice glossy canopy would be greatly appreciated! I have 1/700-scale WWII battleship deck guns on the way in the mail to replace the broken cannons on this ship model, and will post an updated shot when I'm done repairing and touching this ship up.

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For my personal squadrons, I love the Rebel A-Wing and B-Wing models. Here are a couple of shots of my A-Wings. My B-Wings are in progress using this same color scheme (dark grey / light grey / crimson canopy):

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I know that my painting technique still has a *long* way to come, but I've gotten a lot of joy out of seeing peoples' wonderful repaints and want to contribute back to the fantastic community of gamers and artists who have been so inspiring to me.

Great work man! I really like the way you painted those Imperial ships.

You're raising your daughter right! My daughter (also 9) just rolls her eyes whenever I try to get her involved with SW of any flavor. Funnily enough, she pipes up to correct names or facts whenever I get them wrong. I actually say the wrong thing on purpose now, because it tickles me that she's a SW fan in denial, so I keep SW visible & alive at home, on TV, books, games etc.

Keep painting! and let your daughter give it a go. It's one more thing you two can do together to bond over.

Cheers.

My son is a bit younger than your daughter but I'm having luck getting him into the game and he's really enjoying it. It's really nice to be able to share a hobby like this with your kids.

Great to see your ships, keep at it! Hope to see more of your stuff. Cheers!

I finished fixing my Marauder (Kath Scarlet) Firespray-31 build. I finally got the canopy smooth and glossy, and fixed the broken guns by swapping in some turrets from a couple of YT-1300s. There's a bit more dakka to the model now, which is like.

Work on my "Bat Squadron" continues, with Airen Cracken's Z-95 joining the flight.

It looks good with the A-Wings. I've two B-Wings in progress to complete this squadron.

My Fenn Rau gets obliterated immediately in virtually every game I fly. I decided to paint him up in "Suicide Pink" to reward his status as preferred target.

I finished an "inverse" version of my earlier "Suicide Pink" Fenn Rau special. I love this ship, both in the game and to paint -- compared to A-Wings and B-Wings, these things are a dream to paint and highlight. The 2E resculpt of the Fang is objectively a better model than the original 1E edition. Here, Pink = 2E, Green = 1E.

Finally, here's a shot of Boba in the Marauder flying with the lads:

Here's the (Hyperspace Legal) list I'm flying with these ships:

Work in progress on my Resistance "Rainbow Squadron". Upcoming additions include: Yellow & Blue RZ-2 A-Wings, a big pink MG-100 bomber, and a purple or orange T-70.

8 minutes ago, hoarybat said:

a big pink MG-100 bomber

🤨 That the hue doesn't exist in the electromagnetic spectrum (no pink in rainbows) aside, I'm curious how this one is going to turn out. I'm thinking your skills will make it quite nice.

17 minutes ago, Hiemfire said:

🤨 That the hue doesn't exist in the electromagnetic spectrum (no pink in rainbows) aside, I'm curious how this one is going to turn out. I'm thinking your skills will make it quite nice.

It'll be fun, regardless. I've got some neat decal ideas to go with it. I'm also thinking about emulating this famous Porsche racing livery:

https://jalopnik.com/say-oink-to-the-trufflehunter-of-zuffenhausen-5714143

Just now, hoarybat said:

It'll be fun, regardless. I've got some neat decal ideas to go with it. I'm also thinking about emulating this famous Porsche racing livery:

https://jalopnik.com/say-oink-to-the-trufflehunter-of-zuffenhausen-5714143

It's a hog butchering diagram... 🤣 🤣 🤣 That team definitely has a sense of humor.

Finished the RZ-2 A-Wing component of my Rainbow Squadron. (Voltron, Power Rangers, etc. comments unnecessary). I'm ~30% through my Pink Pig, a pink MG-100. The T-70 is going to be teal, orange, or purple -- haven't decided yet.

Finished "The Pink Pig". The Aurebesh says "EAT - ME".

Still undecided on what colors to paint the T-70 I'm adding to this squadron -- Orange, Teal, or Purple?

purple

@Ghosthacked -- that's what I'm going with. I started on a test scheme, didn't like it, and am starting again. The T-70 is a difficult ship to paint!

I suddenly need a ship painted up as the Pork Chop Express...

2 hours ago, Wildonion said:

I suddenly need a ship painted up as the Pork Chop Express...

That's a pretty slick color scheme. Should be eminently doable. And that might be how I finally get around to painting a YT-1300 ... *wheels turn*

WIP shots of the purple T-70 I've added to my Rainbow Resistance.

Next up: A YT-1300 that reflects all of the members of this squadron.

It has been a minute since I've posted -- my lights broke, and I just got things fixed this morning.

Here's a Koshka Frost-inspired Firespray:

And here's my Guri, inspired by beetles in the genus Chrysina (formerly Plusiotis):

A few more working shots. I'll get around to rephotographing these.

PSA: Don't melt one's interceptor with a hairdryer when in a hurry. 😉

My flight of Firesprays. Love this ship!

My PRIDE black one. T-70 canopies are my personal ****. I can paint other small stuff well enough, but there's something about this sculpt that gives me problems.

N'Dru needs a significant price drop.

L3-37's vaporwave coordinate boat.

My purple shard imperials:

That Striker!

These all look great, but I especially love that viper squadron and purple firespray. Nice!

I was able to give a pile of ships away to the awesome folks who attended the Sacramento Campaign Against Cancer event. My daughter and I had a great time, and lots of folks got ships to take home.

I'll be focusing more on my beloved Scum moving forward.

I did manage to take some better shots of my imperial purple squadron before giving them away:

Fenn Rau needed another ride. I went for something close to Tiffany Blue for this one.

On 5/2/2019 at 11:07 PM, hoarybat said:

A few more working shots. I'll get around to rephotographing these.

PSA: Don't melt one's interceptor with a hairdryer when in a hurry. 😉

It's a warpaceptor!

Actually in the pic, it has a really dynamic apperance, I like it.

However, I'd guess in reality it just looks strange, doesn't it? So what did you do with it, keep it, or headed for a future in a 3D debris cloud model?

On 5/27/2019 at 1:30 AM, Managarmr said:

It's a warpaceptor!

Actually in the pic, it has a really dynamic apperance, I like it.

However, I'd guess in reality it just looks strange, doesn't it? So what did you do with it, keep it, or headed for a future in a 3D debris cloud model?

I ended up swapping a new wing in for the damaged wing (as shown in the photos above). I still have it, might use it for something eventually.