Solutions for naked shields

[rebelyell2006]

I've been working on some Marian Romans; specifically I have been planning on what to do with three boxes of Wargames Factory Romans, and I have been basing and painting them individually for Hail Caesar.  There are many possibilities: red plumes and black plumes; red, blue, and off-white tunics; red, blue, and black shields with iron or bronze bosses; and so on.  But the shields look wrong when painted one color.  Should I leave them alone for now, and buy transfers or decals after I pay off moving expenses?  Or are there simple but appropriate designs that I can free-hand paint onto them?

[FierceKitty]

A great deal depends on the scale. I glued on photocopied, reduced designs with my 10mm republican legionaries; tedious, but I couldn't face trying to paint boars and wolves in that scale (though I've not done too badly with some hoplites since then, so perhaps I struck my colours too soon).
If you're doing smaller figures, it's hardly worth bothering with shield designs; if larger, painting should be a piece of cake.

[rebelyell2006]

In this case, they are 28mm plastics.

[AdamPHayes]

Blank shields are perfectly historical, so don't worry about leaving upgrading of the designs until later (or you might grow to like the stark simplicity of it!)