Decision time - what to do with my Dust Germans?

[Willypold]

If it wasn't for the fact that all of the troops for Dust Tactics are wearing uniforms suitable for extreme winter I would have painted them in the DAK scheme, but now I'm a little stumped for ideas. The alternative for the walkers is a simplified Ambush scheme, but without the little paint splotches.

But what about the troops? What exactly did the Germans wear at the end of the real war? Someone mentioned green uniforms. Green, grey, some other colour? I would like to avoid camouflage patterns for the uniforms, though. Any suggestions?

[Aldramelech]

Unfortunately, towards the end of the war the Germans had moved into camouflaged uniforms in a big way, a good way to see how this would have developed post 45 is to look at East German uniforms. Most of the East German kit from the 50's and 60's are developments of late war camo patterns.

You can't really go too far wrong  with whatever you decide to do with colour, even when the Germans were at the height of their power there was a huge variation in uniform colour, there were hundreds of different manufacturers and all turned out kit  in anything from a very light grey to a very dark green just for the basic infantry patterns. There is no real "Right" colour.

Don't be too afraid of camo, it can be really easy to pull off, take a look at my thread and look at my Germans, the pattern is really easy to do. If your interested I'll describe in detail how I did it, simple stuff and quite quick. 

[Willypold]

I'd be interested in hearing about how you did it, as I've tried painting camouflage before, but wasn't able to get it to work in a satisfying way.

[Aldramelech]

Righty ho 

I start with a black undercoat.

Step 1. Paint all the uniform areas Desert Yellow. I've used GW and Vallejo for this and both are good. Leave to dry.

Step 2. Paint blotches of Vallejo Luftwaffe Camouflage Green and Beasty Brown. Don't go too mental with this, there should be roughly equal areas of the three colours with no green or brown next to each other. Leave to dry.

Step 3. Wash with Devlan Mud. If your a fan of dips that should work too. This softens the edges and pulls it all together. Leave to dry.

Step 4. Take each colour in turn and mix with a little white so you get a lighter shade of each. This is the fiddly bit, highlight any creases and edges with the appropriate colour. Again less is more here, don't over do it.

Your done!

There is now an optional step 5. You can add small dots of Bleached Bone on the green and brown areas to give you the spot camo affect. Again, restraint is needed here, a little goes a long way, two or three dots per area will do.

Hope that helps.

[Willypold]

Thanks! I'll try that on one of the figures. I already use a desert camouflage on my Imperial Guard army, spraying the figures and vehicles with Army Painter's desert spray. This is followed by watered down Iyanden Darksun for a warm yellow base, Devlan Mud, and a final drybrush with P3 Menoth White Base and Menoth White Highlight for all uniform and armour parts.

[Aldramelech]

That should give you a good base.