Painting metallic coloured vehicles without an airbrush?

[Valkyrion]

I'm pretty much a straight from the pot painter - I only use brushes, I never use a palette, I never mix or thin paints. 

My hobby time is so limited that I'd rather not waste days of it trying to learn something new. Old dog, new tricks. 

 

So, how does one go about painting something like 30k era Alpha Legion or Thousand Sons vehicles with a normal brush and normal paint pot paints?

 

[LameBeard]

19 minutes ago, Valkyrion said:

I'm pretty much a straight from the pot painter - I only use brushes, I never use a palette, I never mix or thin paints. 

My hobby time is so limited that I'd rather not waste days of it trying to learn something new. Old dog, new tricks. 

 

So, how does one go about painting something like 30k era Alpha Legion or Thousand Sons vehicles with a normal brush and normal paint pot paints?

 

Would a rattle can in a metallic paint count as a “new trick”? Metallic red is especially difficult I understand, but Tamiya do a metallic blue, maybe even two kinds.

 

I think it would also be totally legitimate to have a mostly black/grey/camo rhino with onky metallic accents to represent the paint shortage during the heresy. This might give a nice Rogue Trader vibe. There is also lore about the Emperor’s Children not being able to get enough purple paint for vehicles mid-heresy.

[Valkyrion]

It's the mixing of colour schemes that does for me. I can find a nice marine level recipe for almost everything, but it's not the same colour when applied to a vehicle.

I found a nice, simple, comfortable Death Guard recipe for instance, but applying it to a vehicle was so painfully time consuming and frustrating that I had to abandon it, but not being a big Death Guard fan dampened my enthusiasm too. 

But Alpha Legion and Thousand Sons are my favourite traitors and I've never been able to pull them off to a vehicle level. 

[INKS]

layers, there is no trick to it really. you do not want metal paint to be thick. you don't need a palette, but some kitchen towel. wipe some of it off. keep it consistent. flow improver helps with metals as they can dry fast. 

also do not use water or a wet palette on metals they will separate. 

[N1SB]

I went through this exact issue with 30k Mechanicum, Brother Valkyrion.

 

And I concluded with the exact solution as Brother Lame Bear D, Tamiya Metallic SPRAY (on top of a black spray).

 

My photography skills are even worse than my painting skills, but let me show you a sample:

 

 

Best shown on the Khorne guy on the right.  That's just Tamiya Metallic Red spray over a black basecoat.

 

It has a nice metallic sheen, just doesn't show up great in photos I take.  The Marine Sgt has it too, he's just out of focus.

 

It's thicker than what you're used to, but totally workable for things like Vehicles, even the new 30k plastics, just be aware.

 

The only challenge is in shading...to the point you might want to skip shading entirely.  I did what I wanted, which was:

 

 

This is a converted Mechanicum Explorator thing, it's that thing with AV14 on all sides like a cheap Land's Raider.

 

I don't think you can shade Metallic Red (or Blue or anything) with just Agrax Earthshade.  You use Tamiya Smoke.

 

Tamiya Smoke is this weird syrupy goop that shades yet also makes things more metallic.  Like Agrax Earthshade for metal.

Now, I wanted to have a beat up Mechanicum.  I don't think you want that.  Just skip it entirely, BUT I suggest this:

 

• Experiment with a cheap kit, like a cheap Tamiya tank or an Airfix or something
• Basecoat your 30k Ksons tank as dark a matte black as you can, or whatever you're used to using
• Lay it down, just kinda spray Tamiya Metallic Red on top like a Zenithal (but with spray cans)

 

The result is you get the Metallic Red, but not total coverage, so you still see the black basecoat on the underside, like shadows.

 

Tamiya's Metallic Blue, for whatever reason, is easier to manage than Tamiya Metallic Red.  I really dunno why, red is harder, but I like red.

[Firedrake Cordova]

The infantry are normally done with Contrast over a "silver" base, aren't they?

 

Warhipster has a short video on brush control when using Contrast on vehicles, and a longer demonstration using a Rhino - don't know if it's useful or not:

 

[Bouargh]

42 minutes ago, Firedrake Cordova said:

The infantry are normally done with Contrast over a "silver" base, aren't they?

 

Indeed, but for large panels it is somehow less easy technique to apply. Unless diluting the contrast paint but it may require a 50:50 ratio with medium.

Sometimes the silver layer is better shifted to a golden layer, especially for yellows and some hues of reds or greens. Yet even there some blue metalics and red metallics may be tricky to get by this techinque. I ruined enough models before giving up, even if I am no reference at all. 

[Razblood]

If you don't mind brush painting your vehicles then I can recommend the Army Painter colored metallics (the old line, though I know some of the colours translated over to the fanatic range), Alpha Legion should be easy enough with the blue and turquoise metallics and Tsons with the red, recess shading can be done with Nuln Oil as the newer formula doesn't knock metallics back as much as the old.