Mike Blake
Private 2
- Joined
- Nov 12, 2008
- Messages
- 111
Here’s a product worth looking at if you have a lot of figures to paint, or your technique is not as good as you’d like it to be, and you want to protect your painted figures. It is a clever idea – an ‘instant shader’, if you like. Some people like their painted figures to be ‘toy soldier’ in appearance, with plain colours and a gloss finish. Others like a more natural look, and this is where the Army Painter comes in. It is a tinted varnish which can be used to both shade, ie add shadows (depth), but also to protect, ie seal, painted figures.
The extent to which the figures are ‘shaded’ is a matter of personal preference, of course. The Army Painter actually comes in 3 ‘weights’; light, heavy and extra heavy, to cater for this. Given the perennial concern collectors and wargamers have of keeping paint on their figures, the Army Painter is almost worth it for the varnishing aspect alone. It really does seal the paint on, and gives the figure a tough top coat that will take a lot of rough handling. It is a gloss, though, so if a matt finish is wanted it needs to be treated with an artist’s acrylic matt varnish, which can be brushed or sprayed on once the Army Painter is thoroughly dry, about 24 hours.
It can even be used as a primer on the bare plastic, to make undercoating and painting even easier. It’s main benefit in this guise is that it seems able to cope with the greasy plastic, even when it hasn’t been washed, with little difficulty.
I used it on a variety of different 54mm figures, both as a primer and a top coat. The figures can be dipped into the tin, which is the preferred method for smaller figures but this is a bit awkward with larger ones, or brushed on. An alternative which works is to combine the two techniques; partly dip the figure, ie to the extent that this is easy, and then finish with a brush, pulling the varnish down over the rest of the figure. The shading effect varies with the amount of varnish applied and the colours on the figure. Lighter colours show the shading effect more than darker ones, and some experimentation is need to get it how you want it.
Whites and very pale colours take the effect really well. I spray primed some Moors with Games Workshop white, let it dry, and then put on the Army Painter and let that dry. This shaded the white robes rather well, and then I finished the figures by painting on other colours for sashes, turbans etc. This speeded up the whole process enormously. The shading would have taken much longer had I been doing it on an individual figure by figure basis, but this way the whole unit when from bare plastic to finished over 24 hours!
A tin costs around £18, but will do hundreds of figures, so whilst that might seem rather a lot it actually works out at virtually nothing per figure.
Details at www.armypainter.com
I kn ow some US modellers have used a brand of floor wax to get the same effect, and a friend has done it by staining acrylic varnish with a colour too. I don't know how good either of these methods is on 54mm scale figures.
The extent to which the figures are ‘shaded’ is a matter of personal preference, of course. The Army Painter actually comes in 3 ‘weights’; light, heavy and extra heavy, to cater for this. Given the perennial concern collectors and wargamers have of keeping paint on their figures, the Army Painter is almost worth it for the varnishing aspect alone. It really does seal the paint on, and gives the figure a tough top coat that will take a lot of rough handling. It is a gloss, though, so if a matt finish is wanted it needs to be treated with an artist’s acrylic matt varnish, which can be brushed or sprayed on once the Army Painter is thoroughly dry, about 24 hours.
It can even be used as a primer on the bare plastic, to make undercoating and painting even easier. It’s main benefit in this guise is that it seems able to cope with the greasy plastic, even when it hasn’t been washed, with little difficulty.
I used it on a variety of different 54mm figures, both as a primer and a top coat. The figures can be dipped into the tin, which is the preferred method for smaller figures but this is a bit awkward with larger ones, or brushed on. An alternative which works is to combine the two techniques; partly dip the figure, ie to the extent that this is easy, and then finish with a brush, pulling the varnish down over the rest of the figure. The shading effect varies with the amount of varnish applied and the colours on the figure. Lighter colours show the shading effect more than darker ones, and some experimentation is need to get it how you want it.
Whites and very pale colours take the effect really well. I spray primed some Moors with Games Workshop white, let it dry, and then put on the Army Painter and let that dry. This shaded the white robes rather well, and then I finished the figures by painting on other colours for sashes, turbans etc. This speeded up the whole process enormously. The shading would have taken much longer had I been doing it on an individual figure by figure basis, but this way the whole unit when from bare plastic to finished over 24 hours!
A tin costs around £18, but will do hundreds of figures, so whilst that might seem rather a lot it actually works out at virtually nothing per figure.
Details at www.armypainter.com
I kn ow some US modellers have used a brand of floor wax to get the same effect, and a friend has done it by staining acrylic varnish with a colour too. I don't know how good either of these methods is on 54mm scale figures.
