Topic: My first Empire regiment

[Nick]

[Nick]

Well there you have it my first Empire regiment, Which I have been painting on and off and between other projects for the last couple of months. They can now join my two captains painted and posted alot earlier.

Had a few issues with the varnish went very cloudy and dull on the first spray, which annoyed me, Don't know if that is due to the Temperature, very cold here in the South of England at the mo. I think I managed to salvage them though.

Please leave feed back as well as tips on Varnish spraying not going Cloudy. Perhaps I did not shake the can long enough?

[peraturabo]

I like everything,exept that this is a too small regiment

[Mandarini]

"please" delete

[Inarticulate]

I love it!

[Herostratos]

I don't think it's too dark. In fact, I really like the gritty look you achieved.

The cloudy spray problem is due to GW producing low-grade spray these last years. I switched to Fanatic Army Painter's varnish, no clouding with that one...

[Varium]

They look pretty good, expect they look little boring becuse you have used mainly red. Freehand's(?) look's cool. 

[warhammerlord_soth]

Excellent first half unit... Keep up the good work...

[ekman]

Personally I would not only advise against GW hobby products, but any kind of varnish on plastic models.  Yes it will help but in my experience they don't really need it, and it occasionally will end up giving you problems like fuzzy or too-shiny models. 

I would also advise against painting pupils, because it will generally make them look goofy.  You've only got one guy up front who's eyes are pointing the wrong way (which is actually probably fitting for peasants like these guys), but the rest look fine so I guess this is just a matter of taste.

To build on what Varium said, it'd help to highlight a little more on your red.  I use blood red and it tends to work fine for that shade of red. 

Otherwise, they look pretty great.  Your whites and cream colors are very realistic looking.  Really fantastic work on the lettering and the banner in particular.

[Herostratos]

If the spray's safe, I'd always recommend varnishing your models. Sooner or later the paint will rub off, and that's the time you spent highlighting gone. But I'm a bit paranoid when it comes to that.

[warhammerlord_soth]

Golden acrylics matte archiving varnish.
 
Never looked back after discovering that...

[ekman]

For me, the varnish is yet another thing to spend money on.  First the expensive model, then the primer (which goes fast), then the paints and other supplies.  For the best finish you should use multiple coats of varnish as well, which can make spraycans die quickly.  For regular rank and file guys it just isn't worth it to me.

I also like being able to go back and work on old models, or fix things I didn't have time for or notice when I originally painted them.  A lot of my first models were pretty bad but I was able to go back and bring them to tabletop quality because I never varnished them.

However these are just my personal nitpicks, and there can be absolutely no doubt that if you want to protect your paintjobs, you need to varnish.  I recommend Testor's if you can find it - it works very nicely and I don't think I've had a bad can of it yet.  I use a coat of gloss and then a coat or two of matte which cancels out the shininess.

I've never heard of that spray, Soth - do you think its sold in the States?  A quick google proved fruitless

[warhammerlord_soth]

http://www.goldenpaints.com/products/varnish/msa.php

[Union General]

I like it! Well done, keep it up, and welcome to the forum! 

-The General

[scarletsquig]

Varnish also helps against the inevitable finger grease and dust that models pick up over the years.

Good long-term thing to do.

Use brush-on stuff if you're worried about the spray messing things up, and always test it out on a piece of sprue first to make sure you haven't got a duff batch/ that the temperature is right etc.