Last time On the Painting Desk..... faithful readers, you will recall that I started batch-painting an army for my latest ruleset, Barbarians at the Gates. You will recall that this was a force of about 40 infantry and 10 cavalry (or about 60 models). I have a larger force but this is the core for the example army from the book. The models are from Gripping Beast that I ordered from the Michigan Toy Soldier company. I am trying to batch paint them all together using Armypainter Speedpaints, which is something I have not done with Historicals before. I am not sure how they will turn out compared to my other Historical minis.
You will also recall, that I had managed to assemble them all, undercoat them, and get started on some of the basic painting over the course of a couple weekends. Therefore, they still have a lot to go as I finish their flesh, boots, hooves, and horseflesh before calling it a weekend.
That brings us to today! Looking at where I started.... yikes.... there is a lot to paint still! Let's dive in!
I decided to spend sometime working on the infantry first. I wanted everyone to get some pants on! That meant painting up their leggings and then their pants as needed. For the leggings, I decided to use three colors: Crusader Skin, Hardened Leather, and Holy White. The armored dudes all had leggings, but the unarmored only a smattering had them. I typically gave every third mini the same color leggings.
From there, I decided to use the primary colors on the pants. Those were Highland Blue, Absolution Green, Orc Skin, Slaughter Red, and Fire-Giant Orange. Two people in each unit got the same color pants. This gave them a nice mix of colors. Finally, everyone had some pants on!
This was good progress, but now I had to get everyone's tunics painted up. For the unarmored blokes, this would be the bulk of their color scheme. For the armored dudes, it would be their sleeves and trim under their chain shirts. I used the same colors as I did the legs, but I also added in some other colors for the unarmored types such as Dark Wood, Malignant Green, Pallid Bone, and Holy White for more variety and some less colorful looks. I made sure to mix it up so no one had the same color pants as their tunics. That would be a fashion faux pas!
I did not paint the pants on the horseman yet. They would need to get their Horse armor sorted before I moved onto the riders. That made them out of step with the rest of the minis getting their batch painting done. Instead, I went back and completed the ears, as I missed them last time! I also got the horse tails sorted out as well. This was mostly the same colors I used on the horses themselves with some Grim Black added to the mix. I again made sure not to double up on skin and tail colors.
The armor on the horses and the infantry would need to be the next big painting lift. That would be the bulk of the armored infantry and cavalry models. However, I decided to wait on that lift until the next day. Armor up, weapons next. Then, I would do belts, buckles and details the following day. Then, round it all off with washes and basing. Shields would be another day as well. That left me with about 4 more days of painting to do.
However, the unarmored guys were getting closed to being done than they Cavalry and Armored brothers. Despite the bulk of them being done, they would still take the same amount of time as the rest. Afterall, I was batch painting them. The temptation to split them and paint them as smaller units to completion was strong now. However, that would defeat the purpose of batch-painting!
The end was insight for this project, but for now this was a good days work. Time to take a break. In theory, I think I could paint the whole army in a 7-day painting challenge if I had the week off? That is from box to finished models. I think that would be pushing it though.
I think the Gripping Beast plastics are working really well for batch painting. They do not have the same level of detail as the Victrix models, but as a mass they look really good together and they batch paint up quickly and easily. Very satisfying kit so far. I am looking forward to seeing them all completed.
Until next time!
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