Finally at it again!

Well, it's been a long time.The family moved across country again and I started a new job. With all that going on I've only just now dug my hobby box out of the garage and gotten back to painting my poor neglected band of wee Scotsmen.

One of my motivations was that now that I'm back in Los Angeles, I've found some SAGA gamers much closer to me. The shop is only bout 15 minutes away - as opposed to the 2.5 hour drive I had back in Florida.

So I decided to take another crack at getting my 4 point Scot's warband completed. Since I'm still new to this hobby, I do fancy a bit of an experiment now and again. For my next batch of three figures, I decided to try the painting method described in Saxon Dog's Painting Guide (available as a .pdf if you ask him nicely).

I'll summarize the approach for those not curious enough to request the doc:

1. Prime with white spray paint
2. Wash the figure with black wash 
3. Paint your base color
4. Apply a highlight
5. Wash with brown wash
6. Re-highlight (with the same color as the first highlight)

I guess I'd consider this a Hybrid method. Not as point and shoot as the Army Painter dip method. Not quite as elaborate as the Three Colour method. Somewhere in between.

The idea is that you can get the "black line" look without it being as hard to see the details with a black-primed figure. But I found the black lining to be inconsistent. In some spots it wasn't very dark at all. In some spots the wash dried almost white.

Unlike Saxon Dog who used GW washes, I used the Army Painter inks. Lots of blogs have tested the various washes and inks. Like this one here.

The results:

Yes, I still need to do the bases and the javelins.

What I learned:

I really don't like washes. They always makes things look to dirty or muddy for my taste. I think the washes were helpful on the hair though and might use them again for that.

Keep paint thin (but not too thin). Initially I was too lazy to clean and use my wet palette. I found my paints got goopy on me while I painted (slowly). The wet palette really is your friend.

I really like the da Vinci Restauro 3/0 brush I got. I may have to get more of them.

So, I guess it's back to the Three Colour Method for me. Unless I decide to dabble with VeronaKid’s Shaded Undercoats Tutorial.