To Dip or not Dip? Painting Dwarfs. Painting challenge 2015 Part II

With the equivalent of nearly 70 models painted in the last 6-8 weeks I've been flying through the dwarfs. That's more models than I've painted in 2-3 years! It also means I have my one large dwarf Hail Caesar division finished for our big 4 a side game later in the year

It's mainly thanks to using the Citadel painting station in the evenings. It means I can sit next to the wife and chat away, rather than me sitting painting in my nerd shed. Firstly it means I can get a small amount done every evening. Secondly, and more importantly, it doesn't leave my wife feeling neglected (and then annoyed) as I spend days on end in the shed, a win for both of us.

The other main contributor to my painting speed is Army Painter Quick Shade, namely the dark tone. This has enabled me to concentrate on only base coats for the majority of models, rather than spending a large amount of time washing and highlighting rank and file models. It's worked out very nice on the dwarfs and I've even gone back over a large number of models I painted years ago. These have been touched up where I neglected areas (all their weapon handles and boots were left black out of sheer laziness) and I've also gone back over nearly every shield to brighten them up. I've also painted two character models, but these were painted using the 'old fashioned' method of painting, washing and highlighting. 

Regarding the quickshade. I don't 'dip' the models but rather paint it on using an old brush. I then go back over the model about 5 minutes later and remove a lot of the dip where it has pooled in places I don't want it too. I find otherwise it can go on a bit thick, even with shaking off excess. It also means less waste and your tub lasts longer. I then leave the models a minimum of 48 hours before applying Army Painter Anti-Shine matt varnish.

I've learnt from experience that it has to be warm when you spray the matt varnish to prevent clouding, don't do it in cold conditions. I've a fan heater in the shed I turn on for 10 minutes before I spray models to warm it up a bit. I also do only one side at a time and then leave them for 5-10 minutes between coats, otherwise I sometimes find that the varnish wrinkles as it's applied. While you can sometimes repair the clouding by subsequent varnishing (I paint on GW ardcoat and then spray matt varnish again. This seems to remove most of the clouding. Thanks to JustJohn for the tip!) you can't repair the wrinkling so be careful and, unlike me sometimes, patient.

Here's some sample pictures of what I've finished in the last few weeks. I've still got to go back and base all the miniatures with GW Mourn Mountain Snow and Army Painter Tundra tufts.

These miniatures are dwarf troll slayers that I have painted and dipped. The hair did get an orange drybrush over the red basecoat though to make it stand out. Also the skin got minor highlights to prevent it looking flat due to the large amount of it!

These 4 dwarfs are ones I painted about 6 years ago and are much brighter than the dipped ones. 

The one on the left is an older miniature, while the one on the right is the one recently painted and dipped. The older ones will be getting a dip coat later today!

A selection of the dwarf rangers. I've ten finished in total and ten to do

Some of the dwarf warriors. There are currently 65 finished and 50 left to do

15 out of the 20 hammerers were painted years ago using the older painting method, but have since been touched up and dipped. 5 have been just base-coated and dipped. There's 20 Ironbreakers finished too that need varnishing.

The one on the left is base coated and dipped while the one on the right is base-coated, washed and highlighted (and now dipped!). Up close you can see the difference but when in units they look pretty much the same. The main difference is the face.

One of 2 dwarf organ guns finished along with their crews

The recently painted dwarf characters. These were painted, washed and highlighted. The lord on the bear did get an additional coat of dip for protection as he's a bit top heavy.

Only about 100 more dwarfs to go until finished!

warlord games ruined hamlet

In the previous post I briefly mentioned putting together bolt action scenery and posted some pictures up of the hamlet and church. 

These, along with the fantasy temple and tower, were ridiculously easy to paint. I picked up some grey car spray cans in dealz for €1.49 each, sprayed the buildings and dry brushed them a lighter colour. Then I painted quick shade dark tone over the entire thing, left them to dry for a few days and then sprayed them with a matt varnish. Simples!

All of the pieces were based on 1ft square MDF boards I had cut in B&Q. 8x4 boards are fairly cheap and they have a free cutting service in there. The bases were sanded, painted with generic brown house paint and then flocked. You can buy testers cheap enough in any paint supplier. This is a much more economical technique than painting large scenery pieces using GW paints as their guides would have you do.

Using this method of painting meant that I could get a large amount of scenery done fairly quickly and it looks decent on the table too. Much better than it sitting in boxes for years!

A Scenery bender

Last year I decided that all the things in my shed needed putting together. I figured if I don't have time to paint everything then the best thing to do was get it put together and on the table. At least that way I get to use it, painted or not. All my fantasy figures, hundreds of orcs, goblins and dwarfs got assembled, along with dozens of Space Marines and Tau. I also got stuck in to a load of scenery I had lying around the place. 

There was a temple and tower, both plaster kits I bought from ebay years ago (pictures to follow), along with a good few pieces of terrain for Bolt action (The Waffen SS are assembled but as yet unpainted!), the hovel set and a plastic church. I also built a modular 4ft x 4ft island for pulp alley, which also doubles as a huge hill for battles on a 6x4 table. This turned out ok. It looks nice but I forgot to take into account the bendiness of a stanley blade at full extension so there's some fairly visible lines that need hiding with scenery. Still... it fits together at least! Lastly there was the fort I started, using tips from the old generals compendium. This is still a work in progress though!

Here is a few pics of what I put together. I'm going to follow up at a later date with posts on how to build the island (and what not to do), and a step by step tutorial for the fort. I also purchased some fairly nice roads from Small Terrain on ebay, and at a little more than 11GBP for over 4ft of roads they are fairly cheap. I bought 2 packs to give our gaming groups all we would likely ever need. 

Reaper Dwarf Lord on bear

I've finally gotten around to painting my Dwarf Lord on his bear this week. Its a great model from Reaper Miniatures. I love some of the Reaper sculpts and have a few hero models for my WHFB Dwarfs. They stand out nicely without being out of scale and come in some nice poses, being generally more dynamic than their GW counterparts, which can be very static (but still lovely models). 

The base isn't done yet but the model is completely finished and just needs some varnish. He is going to look great as the commander of my Dwarf division for Hail Caesar Fantasy!