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Miniatures Adventure => Colonial Adventures => Topic started by: Jeff965 on September 01, 2018, 12:38:26 PM

Title: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Jeff965 on September 01, 2018, 12:38:26 PM
This week I painted half a dozen of Iron Dukes excellent Neill's Bluecaps figures to add to some I did earlier in the year.
I recieved some nice comments from you all about the painting especially the white for some reason, so I thought I'd try my hand at a short tutorial to show how I paint the figures.
I really hope this is of some help to some of you, let me know what you think below (for good or bad, he said tentatively lol)
Ok so off we go......

Firstly I've primed the figure using Halfords car primer, it's a lovely flat grey and the nearest grey I've seen to GW Dawnstone which I use to touch up the areas the spray may have missed.

Next I've painted the head, hands, weapon, cartridge box and boots black.

I've then painted the metal areas. Vallejo gun metal on the musket and Vallejo old gold on the belt buckle and butt plate. The gun metal was washed with Army painter strong tone and the gold was washed with brown ink.
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Jeff965 on September 01, 2018, 12:44:05 PM
Next I painted the wooden stock, the bottle strap and the bottle basket GW XV88 brown.
Then the haversack was painted Coat de Armes horse tone dun.
Face and hands GW Mournfang brown.
The headress and water bottle Foundry deep blue 20a
And the white areas CDA  horse tone grey 236
I then washed the bottle basket with dark brown ink
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Jeff965 on September 01, 2018, 12:48:15 PM
Moving swiftly on, I painted small dots of XV88 on the bottle basket to give the impression of a wicker bottle holder.
The flesh areas were painted with GW Bestigor flesh.
The headress and bottle were painted with Foundry deep blue 20b.
Then the white areas were given another lift with CDA horse tone light grey 211
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Jeff965 on September 01, 2018, 12:55:57 PM
Last phase before varnishing, XV88 was mixed with white about 40% xv88 and 60% white. Little dots of this were painted on the bottle basket. The bottle strap was highlighted and wood grain was painted on the musket.

Bestigor flesh was mixed with white again about a 60/40 mix in favour of white and the flesh areas were painted with this. You can add a little more white to that mix and take the flesh up anaother level if you want.

The headress and bottle were highlighted with Foundry deep blue 20c

The haversack was painted with a mix of horse tone dun and white about a 50/50 mix and the highlighted again after adding even more white.

Gun metal areas on the musket are highlighted with GW Mithril silver

And the White areas are highlighted with White
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Jeff965 on September 01, 2018, 01:04:18 PM
Finally the base was painted with CDA horse tone roan, drybrush end with horse tone dun, dry brushed with a 50/50 mix of horse tone dun and white and the lightly dry rushed with pure white.
The figure was then varnished with Winsor and Newton professional Matt varnish.

After varnishing the grass is from Tajima1 miniatures green grass tufts.

And here he is completely finished
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Jeff965 on September 01, 2018, 01:07:11 PM
And here's the six figure skirmish unit. As I say I hope there is something here for some of you, let me know what you think :)
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Romark on September 01, 2018, 01:21:49 PM
Nice work on those minis Jeff  :-* :-*
Tutorial is sure to be popular too,if the earlier responses to your previous posts are anything to go by  :)
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Menelduir on September 01, 2018, 02:25:16 PM
Nice tutorial, thank you for sharing!
I have always had mixed results with painting white, mostly because I have had no plan.
Good ideas here will help me with my VSF Japanese troops.
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: gamer Mac on September 01, 2018, 02:49:40 PM
Nice tutorial, you make it look so easy
Lovely figures :-* :-* :-* :-* :-* :-*
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Captain Blood on September 01, 2018, 03:04:15 PM
Great work Jeff  8)
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Arthur on September 01, 2018, 03:09:55 PM
Wot my esteemed fellow posters said : a most useful tutorial, Jeff  :)
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Mason on September 01, 2018, 04:13:11 PM
Nice tutorial, you make it look so easy
Lovely figures :-* :-* :-* :-* :-* :-*

Wot he said.
A great result!
 :-*

Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Elk101 on September 01, 2018, 04:53:35 PM
Good stuff mate.
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Admiral Benbow on September 01, 2018, 05:49:34 PM
Thanks for your inspiring work, Jeff!
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: swordman on September 01, 2018, 05:49:34 PM
great job!
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: has.been on September 01, 2018, 08:38:15 PM
Thanks for posting, always useful to see how others achieve their effects.
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Flashman14 on September 01, 2018, 10:13:37 PM
Nice - love these sculpts - great movement!
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Malamute on September 01, 2018, 10:36:01 PM
Nice tutorial, you make it look so easy
Lovely figures :-* :-* :-* :-* :-* :-*

This yet again.
I love your crisp clean style. :)
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Jeff965 on September 02, 2018, 07:42:47 AM
Thanks guys, I'm really pleased that the tutorial is of some help to some of you :)
And thank you for taking the time to comment 👍
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: gamer Mac on September 02, 2018, 12:16:32 PM
Thanks guys, I'm really pleased that the tutorial is of some help to some of you :)
And thank you for taking the time to comment 👍
No problem but I don't think the tutorial will be any help unless I had your skill as well :D
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Jeff965 on September 02, 2018, 03:44:14 PM
No problem but I don't think the tutorial will be any help unless I had your skill as well :D

Very kind of you Colin  :)
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Helen on September 02, 2018, 09:16:24 PM
Lovely work Jeff on the tutorial.
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Jeff965 on September 02, 2018, 09:41:39 PM
Thanks Helen :)
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Hu Rhu on September 02, 2018, 09:49:08 PM
So that's how you do it.   :D :D

Thanks so much for the tutorial. Now I can tackle those Indian Mutiny figures with a little more confidence.
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Romark on September 02, 2018, 10:41:31 PM
So that's how you do it.   :D :D


I know,it's almost like Col.Sanders giving up the KFC recipe !  :D
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Dr DeAth on September 03, 2018, 12:11:03 AM
Nice tutorial and a splendid little unit  :-*
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Jeff965 on September 04, 2018, 02:03:21 PM
I know,it's almost like Col.Sanders giving up the KFC recipe !  :D

You can have the recipe but a steady hand, patience and and lots and lots of practice is the only way to get where you want to be with the painting  :)

Thank you all again for the kind comments :)
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Romark on September 04, 2018, 02:27:13 PM
You can have the recipe but a steady hand, patience and and lots and lots of practice is the only way to get where you want to be with the painting  :)
Ain't that the truth!  lol
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: JBaumal on September 12, 2018, 03:14:30 PM
Jeff965, excellent work sir! Beautiful paint job, crisp, clean, very well done.
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Jeff965 on September 12, 2018, 07:02:41 PM
Jeff965, excellent work sir! Beautiful paint job, crisp, clean, very well done.

Thank you sir, glad you like them  :)
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: levied troop on September 12, 2018, 07:12:20 PM
Thanks for that explanation, although you’re not making it easy to resist those nice Iron Duke figures.
Title: Re: Neill's Bluecaps (a short tutorial)
Post by: Jeff965 on September 12, 2018, 08:41:24 PM
Thanks for that explanation, although you’re not making it easy to resist those nice Iron Duke figures.

On the plus side if you do give in and decide to buy some, they are really really nice  :)