Great advice against overdoing rust on minis, I can’t tell you how many Land Raiders I’ve seen that would get a chapter investigated for being Nurgle worshippers.
Here are a few from a historical model building perspective. A lot of vehicles when leaving the factory would already have stuff like tools and stowage boxes already on the machine when it got its initial paint job so stuff like shovels, axes, and cables would probably be the same colors as the vehicle itself with a little bit of wear and chipping of that paint of places that would be gripped or hit against something. You are not lazy you are being “historically accurate” Crews don’t always care too much about spending what would take hours on the camouflage on their machine especially not about making it look attractive and nice. Something slap dash over a nice base coat helps tell that story. Good example of this is the German army during WWII to add brown camouflage to their early war grey tanks was to dip a broom in a mix of mud and gas and just hit the tank with the broom. If you want to add a pop of color find something that on a vehicle could reasonably be damaged and replaced such as the main gun and paint it in a “factory floor color” something that is a different color to the main vehicle and adds a little pop to it. Another historical example of this is Germany using a heat resistant grey on the barrels of their tanks so you occasionally see a German tank in a dark yellow with a grey barrel. A tiny dab on a white or blue oil paint on the model and then brushed down with thinner gives a nice streaking effect like the machine has been out in the rain or just had a thin layer of grime run down it’s hull.
100% man I can’t be bothered painting most of the bits and bobs attached to the exterior of the vehicle and you’re right it’s all basically the same colour anyway!
Coming from a maintenance and repair unit in the military I would agree with your argument regarding rust. In 40K, however, I decided against it for my Guard army because in my mind they have huge stockpiles of vehicles they are throwing into battle and dont bother maintaining them because they have an abundance - and their vehicles have a rather short life span anyway. I mean, let's face it: It doesn't matter if the Leman Russ is sqeaky clean or rusty when it gets blown to pieces by the forces of Chaos. Additionally, in my head canon, they don't always have time in between battles to conduct maintenance and repair battle damage as long it doesn't jeopardize the physical integrity of the vehicle.
I imagine it depends a lot on the 40K battle. If your Guardsmen are a PDF or first responders, holding the line for weeks, months, or even years, you might be obliged to use whatever equipment you have and make it last. Or fail to, as the war grinds on. So long as the parts still work, you - the Guardsman who has been on duty for three shifts straight now due to attrition - might not care much if the rust starts to show on the edges. You're just trying to stay awake. Freshly arrived troops and equipment, meanwhile, is going to look more fresh, yes. At the point when the ponderous Imperial war machine has gotten moving, and the new levies and manufacturing orders have gone through. At that point, a tank is only less disposable than the troops supporting it (who, naturally, are the more expendable asset at the Imperium's command). They churned that stuff out by the millions, you don't need to be precious with it.
For mud effects a cheap and quite effective method is to mix a craft paint brown with talcum powder. I usually mix it rather thick for the biggest clumps and then add water to thin it down where the mud is less thick, As a last step I often thin a small bit down to a wash consistency and hit the whole vehicle, giving it a dusty appearance. The advantage of this method (aside from the low cost) is that all the dirt effects are pretty much the same color throughout. It does do bad things to the brush, so use acheap disposable one.
Speaking from personal experience, aircraft get washed regularly to prevent corrosion. They will have some dirt, grime, and various fluids and grease on places, especially if they've been out in the field for extended periods, but actual corrosion is dealt with as soon as it's noticed.
@@DJRockford83 No, it pits and corrodes. Which produces a white crust. Also,there are steel parts on aircraft, it's just not the main structural or surface pieces.
Smart, fast moving video. I think you covered most. I would consider using an enamel/oil pin wash too. It is surprisingly quick. Who would have thought confetti vs tiny fireworks was THE debate of 2023 😮?
Another excellent presentation of ideas for the creative person. As a modeler for close to fifty years I’ve seen just about everything in products , tips / tricks and trends. You were my introduction to this “ gaming world” Your content is very well done . It’s informative and enjoyable full of insight and ideas. Keep up the great work! Many people I’m sure benefit from your “creations”
Three steps to make your vehicles faster: 1) Paint them red 2) More red, wheel, rotors, underside (thought no one would look? Wrong...) 3) Er... did you try red? Try painting the driver red too! Simple trick for solid canopies is to gloss varnish them (with a brush on varnish) as the final step after general varnish. Instant natural shine! P.S. Remember your grav/hover vehicles land sometimes too. That's when they get mud on the parts that touch the ground.
If you have raised surfaces on a vehicle and you can use toxic paints, you can use enamels for reverse wash technique to paint them accurate and fast without masks. Like curvy ornaments on knights: 1) spray whole model with a silver lacquer paint (with airbrush or spray can) 2) spray Tamiya enamels for panel colors 3) wipe off enamels from ornaments with white spirit using just a brush or some other less hairy stuff (like Gaia finishing master sticks) 3.5) use some diluted dark enamels as washes on metal parts Enamels in general are good for using on big models for basic panel lining, not talking about effects. P. S. You said a lot about military stuff having one color, it`s not always like that, especially for european vehicles. But if we talk about saving time and having several colors, we can use some pre-cut pattern masks, like using hexigonal pattern for sci-fi.
Thanks for the simplistic view Uncle Atom! I've never been great at doing vehicles and so I procrastinate doing them. I'll try this method out and see if it helps! :)
nice video. i think the point you made about rust is great. of course if someone wants rust that's fine, but it does make sense that futuristic vehicles aren't going to rust too much.
I love painting vehicles. They are big and largely color uniform, which means you can simplify the process a lot while still getting great results. Here's how I paint my vehicles (after having primed the figurine): -Basecoat in a primary. -Basecoat the lower half of the figurine in a darker color. This creates contrast and depth and makes the leading edges pop more. -Drybrush with a highlight with a large round brush (like a make-up brush). -Paint assecories. -Zeal with a varnish. Some tips: -For metallic parts, I like to basecoat with dark color like black than drubrush with a mettalic. This very effective at creating depth while being low effort. -I like to drybrush exhausts and barrels with black. Very effective and low-effort way for creating a zoot effect. -An airbrush makes painting vehicles a dream.
I found for my imperial guard tanks, i went full grimy. Lead bletcher prime, sponged on some black paint for striping, picked out the rivits in a dark iron and then slathered it in a brown shade. Threw some technical mud paint on the tracks and painted the lights and done. Made it look like a tank that was stuck in a muddy, smog filled, wasteland of a world, perfect for relics from krieg imo
Your painting techniques are always fairly simple but brilliant uncle atom! A lot of that advice could be applied to vehicles that are primarily terrain in either a near modern setting or indeed great war era. A lot of games use Vehicles, whether mechs, tanks, helicoptors, etc. Ty for showing that!
Speaking of rust on military vehicles. The most common weathering effect on unprofessionally maintained vehicles is layers and layers of flaking paint, applied directly over the previous layer without any preparation or priming. This could be common in totalitarian regimes - regulations require a lot of stuff to be exactly as stated, but education is too poor to actually do anything properly. Vehicles in active warzone are usually even more weathered - they are maintained by the crew, in best of times, and buttoned in worst of times. In something akin to trench warfare, like the omnipresent 41st millenium, it will probably resemble the surrounding terrain by the time the battle actually happens. Edit: a good technique for silver edges is to use the flat side of a pencil. (also, in long conflicts many vehicles come really close to post-apocalyptic aesthetic. Like, REALLY close.)
My recommendation is to look at scale modeling techniques. A bit more work, but things like panel highlighting, oil/enamel washes, and other weathering tricks that will quite easily enhance any vehicle. Scale modelers got it all in their toolbox, why don't wargamers?
@@JinKeeHow time constrained are you, really? Gauge the effort you want to put in and go for that. The stuff I listed are some pretty low effort ways to get really nice results.
I would suggest one more step for vehicles that's really easy, panel liner. Tamiya makes great panel liner in many colors but black almost always works. I use it on space marines too
I've thought that Plasteel and Ceramite wouldn't rust since first edition and that it would be the same colour all the way through rather than a paint job with metal underneath. Whatever the STC was chucking out right? But the language of battle is in those scuffs and scratches. Its how we read the narrative of a piece, through our own grubby wars. For all we know some 40k armies stride into battle pristine with tiny void shields that repel dirt. Grimdark was always a state of mind for me; there are no heroes. Yeah some worlds are muddy
As stated in the beginning, the best way to do your vehicles, is to play skirmish games where you don’t need vehicles! Personally I think terrain painting is the worst, so I can’t imagine how I would handle painting a vehicle!
Thank you for the rust comment… the number of people I’ve seen putting rust on things like the moving parts of pistons… how would that even happen on a working vehicle?
Given white is inherently problematic, for simplicity is there an "air" white or something close you'd recommend for doing black vehicles? Or would a bright metallic silver be better? Or, for the times I do a gunmetal base coat what would be a good highlight color on top of that?
I wonder why 3dprints have these lines on flat surfaces that are not layer lines, I mean I know how I aligned the parts, but there are nasty lines that are nor parallel to the build plate
yes neat stuff if do lot 1950s gaming you do the two tone car thing but yes to days stuff just one coloer if do camo and to day camo a pain in bleep if do that well thats great me if do it i go with the 1990s one jugel paden thats my think nest vid as go
This is military modelling sacrilege to say, but I think hobbyists absolutely go overboard with rust. They do an amazing job of giving a year-old WWII tank as much rust as my parents' 1979 Fiat sedan, but it's a little distracting to me.
