# Fun painting!



## Owen E Oulton (Jan 6, 2012)

I just spent an enjoyable evening paint the camouflage on a trio of figures for one of my Jeep models - a captured Jeep in German markings towing a Nebelwerfer. The figures were in the spring leaf camouflage - a relatively complex one. I started out by painting the field grey areas, namely the pants on two of the figures and the officer's cap. Then I gave the camouflage areas a coat of Avocado craft paint, followed by large blotches of Leaf Green and a darkened Hunter green. Lastly I took a piece of styrene rod and used it to place tiny dots of all three colours over the contrasting areas. It's been thirty years since I did a camouflage tunic like this - back then it was in autumn colours, and only one figure. I just went slow and steady - the task was almost hypnotising and very relaxing. I'm just getting things ready for CapCon 2013, our local IPMS semi-annual show next Saturday. I'll post photos next week.


----------



## irishtrek (Sep 17, 2005)

What, no images????


----------



## Owen E Oulton (Jan 6, 2012)

Read the last sentence of my post.


----------



## Owen E Oulton (Jan 6, 2012)

I've always been skeptical when I read about people painting the eyes of figures with toothpicks (I still am...), so this was my first attempt at doing dots with a solid pointed object. It worked, so I decided that for my Dradon Soviet Motor Rifle Troops I'd try it for the tiny red stars on their fur hats. It would be too fiddly in 1/35 scale to actually paint a star, and nobody would actually be able to tell the difference between a star at that size and a tiny blob, so I uses a piece of .020 styrene rod to deposit a dot of semi-gloss red on the front of the hat. Worked like a dream. I'm putting them on a base with a BRDM-2 (also by Dragon) for the same show. Pics AFTER the show.

I *do* have to get a new 000 brush, though.


----------



## irishtrek (Sep 17, 2005)

Owen E Oulton said:


> Read the last sentence of my post.


Uh, I guess I missed that last sentence there.


----------



## djnick66 (May 2, 2008)

Yeah oddly toothpicks do work! I will dip one in CA glue to harden it up, then use an X-Acto to shave it down sharper and finer. 

Also, for fine painting, instead of trying to buy the tiniest 20/0 brush get a good 0 or 00 with a very fine point. It's much more useful and easier to get the paint off the brush onto the model.


----------



## Owen E Oulton (Jan 6, 2012)

000 is the finest I use. I've had very good results painting eyes with it. I agree that going to smaller and smaller brushes is a case of diminishing returns, as the volume of paint held by the brush gets smaller as well. My technique for eyes is to first paint a fine line for the eyelashes, followed by a mix of flesh and white for the eyeball, a dot of colour for the irisl and lastly a bit of flesh to give the shape of the bottom of the eye. A tiny dot of black for the pupil and a dot of white for the catch-light in larger scales finishes it off. The secret is to never paint the eyeball area straight white, to make sure that the irises point in the same direction and to make the eyes the right size.


----------

