Painting detail – body
With the head drying the detail can be added to the body; use the same process as above. I try and start with the lighter colours and go darker as I add the detail. Don’t add any metal detail as this will be done at the end. Once you are happy seal everything in with a gloss varnish, I use Klear for this. Various washes can now be added to give more shadow. I use Games Workshop Devlan Mud and Black; the black for the darker areas and the brown mud around the lighter areas such as the parachute. Once dry this is finished off with a matt varnish – I like Vallejo matt varnish thinned down with their own thinner.
Adding some life to your figure
Now to try and add some life to that face. With a detail brush very carefully add the white to the eyes and then using either a brush or a cocktail stick add the black pupils. Be careful doing this as it’s very easy to miss-align the eyes and get a cross-eyed look or the reverse. Paint in the eyebrows and give the lips a covering in a slightly reddish tone of the base flesh colour. Once this stage is done gloss varnish the head and leave to dry. Now in order to get some shadow into the face I use Games Workshop Ogre Flesh wash that I carefully paint into the recess around the eyes, around the face/helmet junction, around the nose/mouth and around the neck. Subtlety is the key here, don`t over-do it otherwise the face will look all wrong. This can all then be finished off with a matt varnish and the goggle lenses are given covered in Krystal Klear to get a glass effect.
Add your head to the body
The head can now be added to the body and the metal parts painted in using Gunze Metallic colours. The finishing touches is to add mud pigments to the boots, knee caps and bottom area , basically any part of the anatomy that will come into contact with the ground. For this you can use Tamiya weathering sets or AMMO-Mig Productions Pigments.
And you’re done!
That’s him done, it’s just now a case of finding a suitable mount for him to go with and I had just finished a Hasegawa Fw190 A-6 that was the perfect choice. I hope this little tutorial will help take the mystery away from how to paint figures as I think, especially in the larger scales, that they can really bring a model to life.
Dave C.