The Process Part Four: Drybrushing

Drybrushing is an inherently messy process, so I do it all before block painting. That way I can cover any over-brushing with my base coat.

Three of the uniforms have red-tipped green plumes. I want the green to really pop, so I add a little pale yellow to my green.

The drybrushing itself goes quickly. The contrast between the dark and light green is working well.

One uniform calls for red-tipped white plumes. I usually use Delta's "Oyster White" as it is mellower than straight white.

Once the green and white drybrushing are done, I start painting the plume tips brown to provide my contrast with red.

Red it one of the trickiest colors for me to paint. I have never found a craft paint that gives good enough coverage. For years I used Vallejo 70.957 "Flat Red," but they have reformulated their paints, and the new formula is not working for me. I picked up a few other bottles at the local gaming store, two of Vallejo's Game Color series and one of Citadel Technical. The Game Color "Scarlet Blood" ended up being just right.

The plume tips require a gentle touch. This is the slowest part of the drybrushing process.

For most 15mm figures' hair, I drybrush a dark brown shade directly over the black primer. This is the ever useful "Brown Iron Oxide" from Delta Ceramcoat. I tend to make the drybrush a little heavier here.

Delta's "Bambi Brown" acts as my drybrush shade for the calfskin backpacks. This step gets especially sloppy, but any mess get fixed in the next step.

It took three days, but the drybrushing is complete on all 468 figures.

 The next step is to block paint my base shade on all the figures. I'm not sure how much of this will be of interest, since presumable everyone viewing this blog is familiar with basic painting.