Painting

I am not the best of painters, but badly painted models are better than models which are not painted at all. I will try and guide you through the stages of painting in easy to follow steps.

(1) Preperation
The preperation of the models is very important. First get a sharp knife and a file. Being very carefull with the knife, trim off any excess resin (this excess is called flash) that may be on the model, especially around the base or any seams. In some cases the flash/model may need a file to trim and smooth the edge.

(2) Undercoat
The reason for the undercoat stage is to ensure that the base coat has something to adhere. In the photo above I have got a spray can of Matt White paint from a DIY store and gave a gently spray of paint evenly over the surface.

(3) Basecoat
Next I used a round headed brush and push the very dark grey base coat into all the areas of the model. The model needed three coats to create an even colour over the model.

(4) Middle coat
Using a flat edge brush, I took the brush, dipped it in the medium grey Middle Coat and then on a peice of paper - brushed the majority of the paint off so that the brush is almost dry. I then gently brushed the model so that the remainder of the paint on the brush went on to the raised parts of the model. This process is called dry brushing.

(5) Top coat
Repeat the previous stage, using the light grey Top coat paint, but using even gentler strokes gently brush the model again. This even gentler brush strokes will ensures that the Middle coat of paint still shows through with the Top coat only covering the most raised parts of the model.

Paint

The models have been painted using my own mixture of paint. I obtained two tins of paint from a local hardware store - a Matt White Emulsion and a Matt Black Emulsion. The Matt White was easy to obtain, the Matt Black was a different matter - apparently in the UK very few manufacturers make a Matt Black Paint. So the I had to have a tin of Matt Black Emulsion mixed - this cost me £9.99 for 1 litre of paint.

The paint is mixed as follows to produce the Basecoat, Middle coat and Top coat: