How does one paint (15mm) vehicles?

[Ockman]

I've been painting miniatures and terrain for twenty years, but I've never painted a vehicle. What are your best tips?

The large open spaces scares me

[Anna Elizabeth]

I use spray can or airbrush to basecoat my 15mm vehicles. It's a good way to get smooth even coverage on a vehicle.



 These late Tiger E's were primed with Tamiya Dark Yellow spray Lacquer, and the camouflage was added with airbrush and Vallejo acrylics.



 These Afrika Tigers were airbrushed with Vallejo Model Air primer and colors to be "Tunisian" Tigers. All these 15mm tanks were then finished with brush work on the details and highlights.

 

[Ockman]

Thanks for the tips, although I have no airbrush. How does one paint vehicles with a brush?

[Westfalia Chris]

For 15mm, the most important thing would be meeting a "sweet spot" compromise between paint opacity and thin coats.

I usually basecoat vehicles in any scale in a medium grey. On top of that, I apply several thin coats of the vehicle base colour, so that the details don't get obscured, but aiming for an even coat.

Next, I add any camouflage patterns, again in thin coats, and paint in details such as tires and tracks.

Once the colours are blocked in, I apply an overall wash in a tone suitable to the desired final effect. For example, for anything in camouflage browns or greens, I usually take a wash of sepia and dark grey tones, thinned down quite strongly and removing excess wash from larger areas to avoid puddling. This wash goes over all areas of the vehicle.

After that, I touch up the main areas with the base colour, and maybe add some even stronger highlights around sharp edges - I guess in 15mm this should be even more important.

Weathering like dust effects I usually add as washes on the areas where dust would normally accumulate, or as a soft drybrush on the running gear.

I don't have pictures of 15mm figures handy, but I've attached a pic of a 1/76 scale Matchbox Comet plastic kit which was painted in this exact method. If you could give us some more specific details on what you intend to paint, e.g. period, faction, or specific paint schemes, I'm sure we could provide you with more specific tips.

[Ockman]

Thanks Chris, I'm both going to paint a minor spaceship from Khurasan and some vehicles from the Ion Age.

The spaceship will be gray with perhaps some yellow markings and I think I'm going single colour on the Ion Age vehicles.

Pics of the models:

[MartinR]

Tbh, you can't beat a dry brush on a vehicle, especially one which is covered in angles and rivets (like that truck), brings out all the edges even if it can look a bit exaggerated.

My basic vehicle technique is fairly straightforward :

Spray on a black undercoat. For larger scale stuff I might do a light spray of white foam about two feet up on the upper surfaces (so it ends up as mid grey with low lights).

Very heavy damp brush of the base colour all over. If needed, I might do a couple of coats in progressively lighter colours. More painstaking people than me sometimes paint the highlight colours rather than dry brushing.

Camo patterns. Hard edge is easy, spray patterns I do with a stippling brush.

At this stage I may do a wash, brown over sand/brown or black over green/grey. I often don't bother.

Lots and lots of mud over the running gear, I usually just paint tracks mud colour these days.

Paint tyres (Yes, after the mud).

Decals, details (crew, windows, tools, weapons, stowage etc).

Highlight the muddy tracks with a dark wash.

An overall very light dry brush of pale tan (eg VJ Iraqi sand) which lightens the mud and brings out the angles. If it is a very light colour scheme, then follow up with a very, very light dry brush of pure white. Do this on the tyres too to bring out the tread.

Finally, highlight the burnished sections of track with steel.

Job done. You aren't going to win any painting competitions, but it is quick, easy and good enough for War gaming stuff. When I'm on a proper computer I'll post a couple of pictures.

[Ockman]

Great tutorial, MartinR! Love to see some example pictures!

[WuZhuiQiu]

Take a look here (not my blog, but very informative and inspiring):

http://ritterkrieg.blogspot.ca/

[john Hollyoak]

Troy at Ritterkrieg is brilliant but I also recommend Reuben Torregrosa at Heresy Brush. He does use an airbrush but still plenty of splendid stuff.